Crimson Sands
by Rogue Force
Summary: The Rogue Force team is attached to a larger force and sent to Saudi Arabia to stop a large arms deal
1. Default Chapter

DISCLAIMER: We don't own these charaters, Hasbro does. This story takes place shortly after the events taking place in our story, "Homefront". Please read and review.  
  
  
  
  
"ROOM A-TEN-SHUN!" Someone barked out as the general strode purposefully into the large stadium seating briefing room. Hawk quickly took his place on a podium to the side of the stage.  
"At ease." The general called out, projecting his authoritative voice out into the room. "You've all been assigned to take place in a mission code named Operation Barricade." As the general spoke, he pressed a series of buttons on a small remote control in his hands, dimming the lights of room while a map was projected onto a screen placed on the back wall of the stage. The shading and contour of the map indicated a desert environment. Several spots on the map were marked with simple, color-coded symbols. "What you're looking at is a terrorist camp in a north western section of Saudi Arabia. This organization is a group of Muslim Extremists that are intent on carrying out anti-U.S. and anti-Israeli terrorist actions within the Middle East. Recently the leaders of this organization have stuck a deal with Cobra to be supply with several high-end weapons from the few remaining MARS facilities that Cobra has left. We cannot allow such a destabilizing group to get their hands on these weapons." Before continuing, Hawk pressed another button which animated three red trucks moving towards the a cluster of red tents. "At some point within the next few days the Cobra convoy will move through this area. This is where we will spring our attack. A two-man forward observer team, SPYGLASS, will have moved into this position once the convoy is detected. SPYGLASS will then call in artillery on the convoy. The artillery, THUNDER, will be made up of two Sluggers and two specially configured Wolverines. Once THUNDER has weakened the convoy, an armor group will move it and finish off the convoy. The armor group, JACKAL, will consist of Three MOBATs, two Maulers, and two VAMP Mark-Twos. At exactly the same time that these groups attack the Cobra convoy, an air strike will be taken against the Terrorist camp. The air strike, GOD, consisting of two Ghoststrikers, will make a single pass on the camp before two infantry teams are fast-roped directly into the camp via several Tomahawks. The first infantry team, HUNTER, will seek out an eliminate any and all remaining hostiles in the camp while the second infantry team, KILLER, will destroy any remaining structures and equipment. Likewise, HUNTER and KILLER will be supported by GOD and later, JACKAL once their original objectives are complete. The entire operation will be tactically commanded by a temporary base in the theater, known as NESTEGG." Hawk waited for the map's animations to finish and then watched as various pencils throughout the room slowly stopped moving, wanting all of his people's full attention for his next words. "I can't stress this next point enough. This operation is a clean sweep. I want absolutely zero survivors from either Cobra or the Terrorists to leave that desert alive. Does everyone understand?" Hawk asked rhetorically, his voice slightly more intense than usual. No one answered. Silence was compliance. "All right," The general started, the dark look on his face fading somewhat as he pressed a button, changing the map to a list of names. "NESTEGG will be the tactical command base for this operation. All vehicles and supplies are already on site as is Psyche-Out, who will be the theater commander for this mission, in addition to Sparks and half of the listed reservists. Law and the remaining reservists must transport there." Hawk's finger hit the button again, causing the list to change to new set of names each time a new detachment of the operation was listed. "HUNTER will need to take their own weapons and equipment with them for transport and will consist of Falcon, Leatherneck, Repeater, Long Arm, Hardball, Fast Draw, Flash, Grunt, and the following reservists. KILLER will need to take their own weapons and equipment, however demolitions material will be procured at NESTEGG; its makeup will be Ripcord, Zap, and the following reservists. JACKAL will need to take their own personal weapons and equipment however your vehicles will be waiting at NESTEGG; it consists of Steeler, Hotseat, Cross Country, Back Stop, Clutch, Crankcase, Heavy Metal, and the following reservists. THUNDER will need to take their own personal weapons and equipment however your vehicles will be waiting at NESTEGG, it's makeup is Long Range, Thunder, Grand Slam, and Covergirl. SPYGLASS will need to take their own weapons and equipment and consists of Spirit and Downtown. GOD is already onsite at King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh. Any questions you have can be answered by Psyche-Out once you're on site, additionally he will explain your mission in detail once everyone is on site. Once this briefing is over you'll gather your gear and report to the helipad to catch one of the UH-60s that's headed for Pope AFB. Once everyone is at Pope you'll board a C-141 bound for King Khalid where you'll then switch over to several UH-60s to be taken out to the operational area. Remember people, the convoy could arrive at any time during the next week so stay alert over there. Good luck."  
"ROOM A-TEN-SHUN!" Someone again call as Hawk raised the lights before strode off of the stage and out of the room.  
  
  
"Good old Wolverine." She said to herself, as the team exited the briefing. She was glad the Rogues were paired up. Zap would watch Ripcord's back, Ripcord could watch for Zap. Fast Draw and Repeater. Hotseat and Heavy Metal. And she had the Wolverine, 600 horses and 20 tons of steel and missiles. The team would be fine. Still, it made her uneasy, the fact that it would be more than just the seven... well, eight of them, if you counted the Wolverine. She planned on leaving Murphy at home. Not that she was cocky enough to think Rogue Force could handle an assignment of this scale on their own, but Long Range, Thunder and Grand Slam? She was supposed to trust them? How do you trust someone right off the bat, she questioned. Were they even at A10? A few of the reservists names she had recognized, people she'd seen at A10 or around the motor pool at various points, but still, that wasn't trust. She shook her head to try and clear it of the negative thoughts. She caught sight of the M.P. who'd covered for them with Courage as he was gearing up, throwing him a quick wink, before motioning for him to come join them. She acted before catching sight of the officer standing beside him, quickly dropping her gaze and straightening her ALICE gear, not wanting to run the risk of making eye contact with an officer. She was still getting used to seeing them, getting used to the more relaxed atmosphere of the base. She smiled as she remembered armor tech school, the lengths she and her squad would go to avoid officer contact, from faking tying a shoelace, to dropping books, to actually changing direction. She winced when she saw the young officer had joined him, popping up a quick salute, before the three joined Fast Draw and Repeater, who had already assembled on the tarmac.  
"Me and you big guy! Just like old times!" Fast Draw kidded, punching Repeater in the arm. She shook her head as she approached the two. "Krieger!" He called out, turning his attention towards her. "Damn, Babe," He said, eyeing the olive drab vehicle crew jumpsuit she was wearing. "I still prefer the bikini, but if I said you had a beautiful body would you hold it against me?" She gave him a puzzled look as he chucked her under the chin. "Would you hold me against it?" He finished, giving the female tanker an adrenaline-induced bear hug, picking her up off her feet, putting her down and releasing just as quickly.   
"Obnoxious..."   
"You know, I notice you tend to say "fuck around me a lot... subconscious maybe?" He interjected.   
"Obnoxious Shit." She finished the phrase with a smile, causing him to laugh as well, before he and Repeater caught sight of the officer, both throwing a salute in his direction.  
  
The rest of the team had almost finished meeting up at the helipad after grabbing their gear and requisitioning the weapons. Like most other things with the team, it was unspoken, just a fact. They would meet up first, they would take the same transport over. They were still a team. She smiled when she saw Ripcord's figure looming towards them, his confident gate undaunted. His arm lightly brushed hers as he came to a stop next to the tanker, causing her to stifle another smile in front of the team. It was a "hello Courtney from Wally" gesture disguised as a nonchalant move from Specialist Weems. He was wearing desert BDU's, the lighter color bringing out his broad shoulders and chest, plus it highlighted the light green in his eyes. The stiff government issued fabric always made him stand a little straighter, look even more self-assured. Her smile faded when she noticed the gauze bandage peeking out from his forearm, unsure if the harsh jungle conditions were responsible for the delay in healing, or if it merely looked that bad that he felt the need to keep it covered.   
She noticed a few other jumpsuits besides her, Heavy Metal and Hotseat, congregated in an area not too far off, waiting to board their own ride. One of them nodded and smiled in her direction starting to give her a hand signal. The movement caused her to instantly shift her gaze back to her own team.   
"All right, people," Hotseat told them, making the final count to make sure they were all there. "Let's mount up and head out." Without skipping a beat he pointed to the young soldier about to open his mouth. "Fast Draw, keep the comment to yourself."   
  
The seven boarded the rotary wing craft, followed by Law, and the officer who simply called himself Falcon. Fast Draw's typical banter was toned down, but he still sniped imaginary targets with his imaginary weapon. The familiarity was comforting. Across from her sat Zap, staring at the more current picture of his family, taken on the same set of steps. She turned her attention away when he began showing the photo to two of the other soldiers on the transport, one she recognized from A10 as Clutch, the other who introduced himself as Spirit. Repeater, as always, was Repeater. She stared at him for a long moment, thinking back to... what was her name? Wasn't important, the woman who'd known him at the beach. What happened to him back in 'Nam. She remembered his face back in Brazil, when Zap was almost impaled, and how he'd protected both her and Heavy Metal in the mine field. He sat stoically, staring into nothing, either unaware or uncaring that someone was staring at him. Hotseat and Heavy Metal, dressed similarly to her and Clutch were carrying on a conversation about marriage, Heavy Metal discussing his plans with his soon-to-be bride, Hotseat offering his now typical fatherly advice. Next to her sat Ripcord, his deep green eyes more serious, his face taking on a slightly harder edge. She imagined he was doing the same, replaying the general's words about the operation being a clean sweep. 'I want absolutely zero survivors from either Cobra or the Terrorists to leave that desert alive.' He caught her staring at him, offering a quick wink, his face for a brief second retaining its softer features. She gave him a faint smile before closing her eyes and leaning back against the hull. Her smile faded as she replayed more of the Generals briefing in her mind. He and Zap were demolitions. Team KILLER. Even the name alone was disturbing. She thought back to the Viper he felt he'd murdered, to his words back at his mother's house, about pulling the trigger, about losing himself, about the promise she'd made to him. "I won't let you down." She whispered, mainly to herself. "I don't make promises I can't keep."


	2. Chapter 2

The high pitched drone of the four engines of the C-141 was swiftly becoming maddening to Ripcord. He already didn't like the layout of this mission. He never was a big fan of the hurry-up-and-wait aspects of the Army. He would have preferred to just have been ordered directly to the target site. The longer you had, the more time for doubt and worry to settle in. He tried to push the thoughts away as he focused in on the various actions he'd been performing over the course of the flight. All were merely double checks that he could've performed much later but the small actions helped to settle his restlessness. He kept his eyes trained on the single bullet that he slowly thumbed out of the magazine. As he closely inspected the bullet, he mentally reviewed the facts about it, nearly speaking his thoughts aloud. It was the twenty-sixth round in the second magazine he'd checked. 5.56mm NATO, .223 caliber, full metal jacketing, used in the Colt M-16A2 assault rifle in thirty round magazines. As he slowly pushed the round back into a separate, previously empty magazine his methodical cycle was broken as Covergirl, who'd remained uncharacteristically silent through the flight, spoke up.  
"Heads up." She said simply in a voice that just had enough power to carry over the engines. Ripcord shot a quizzical look over at Covergirl, who only nodded towards the nose of the aircraft. The paratrooper swung his green eyes back towards the front of the Starlifter, catching sight of the approaching form a man who was also clad in desert scheme BDUs. As the soldier neared his position, Ripcord saw more details of the man's uniform, most noticeably two small tan patches on his collar, each with a single black bar stitched into it. First Lieutenant Falcone, U.S. Army. Qualified as senior parachutist, expert medic, and expert infantryman. Served in a special forces unit prior to this assignment. The corner of Ripcord's mouth raised slightly as his mind processed the facts as he finished 'reading' Falcon's uniform. Jesus, this can't be too experienced, he's spent nearly all of his career in schools. The Green Beret's casual stride came to stop near where Ripcord sat as Falcon slid into an open area of the web seating near the paratrooper. The officer gave a confident smile and extended a hand towards Ripcord.  
"Ripcord?" He asked rhetorically "I'm Falcon." After Falcon finished his small greeting, Ripcord extended his own arm in return. As they shook hands, the paratrooper took note of the difference between their left arms. The officer's sleeve rolled up in perfect military fashion and bare hand seem the exact opposite of Ripcord's; the paratrooper opting for leaving his sleeves free and wearing his black leather utility gloves. Partially to prevent sunburn in the coming environment, but also to hide the layers of bandages that still coiled around his left arm.  
"Pleasure, sir." Ripcord responded as he pulled his hand back, again focusing his actions on the inspection of his ammunition.   
"I hear you've seen a lot of action in your time with the unit." Flacon said in an attempt to spark a conversation with the paratrooper.  
"I guess you could say that sir." Ripcord spoke absentmindedly, his thoughts roaming somewhere between the forthcoming assault and avoidance of thinking of the forthcoming assault. "I go on whatever missions I get assigned to and I try to accomplish the goals of the mission as best I can. I've just been lucky so far sir." He offered, not taking his eyes of the individual rounds.  
"Maybe," Falcon said in an almost musing tone. "But skill is factor too."  
"Skill does count for something," The paratrooper responded as he slowly turned a bullet between his fingers, the plane's dim interior lights glinting off the brass casing while he examined it for imperfections. "But Murphy is a real bastard about showing up at all the wrong times, and when he throws a monkey wrench in the works, then it's only Lady Luck that has a good chance of saving your ass. Sir." As he finished with a slight shrug, he slowly slid the round into the spare magazine, stopping its point just short of the magazine's metal wall.  
"That's a rather grim philosophy to have." Falcon responded in his same steady, optimistic tone.  
"Well sir, war is a grim thing." Ripcord said flatly. The officer only offered a slow nod before he stood and took a few more steps, sliding back down beside Covergirl and introducing himself to her. At least that's what Ripcord thought he heard coming from the two. His mind was still elsewhere. The details of the environment around him seemed to blur as he focused all of his attention on the thin shells that he thumbed free of the magazines. At some point, twenty-nine rounds later, the edge of his vision caught the sight of Falcon passing by, finished with his introductions to everyone at the back of the aircraft. Much later, after Ripcord slid the final round home in the tenth magazine, he replaced all of the magazines in their original pouches, save the one he slapped into his rifle and the empty one that was replaced into his LC-2 ruck that was positioned between his feet. Once everything was back in place, he leaned his head back against the cool metal hull of the Starlifter, resisting the urge to glance at his watch. It would only make matters worse. Ripcord let out a small sigh as he ran a gloved hand through his close cropped red hair. It was gonna be a long flight.   
  
Ripcord took another swig from one of his two canteens at he stared down at the near featureless stretch of desert that raced by just a few hundred feet below the reverberating airframe of the UH-60. While the dry air and harsh sunlight of the Middle East wasn't anywhere near the oppressive and debilitating humidity that he'd encountered just two weeks ago in the jungles of Brazil, it was still something that he'd preferred not to deal with. He carefully shifted in the seat's harness, taking great care not to move his left shoulder as he placed the canteen back in its cover on his right hip. He shot another quick glance over at Covergirl, asleep in the seat next to him, her head slumped over onto his shoulder. A combination of the heat, long flight, and the slightly quaking hull of the Blackhawk caused her to drift off a short time after they dusted off from King Khalid. As Ripcord adverted his eyes from the sandy landscape, he first caught sight of Law as his view panned forward, the soldier in the rear-facing seat directly across from him. He noticed the stocky MP staring blankly at the metal deck of the chopper while he patted the side of his up-turned M-16's stock, keeping rhythm to something in his head. The paratrooper noticed as the fellow Joe's head panned up, causing Ripcord to offer a silent nod to the MP, wordlessly thanking him for his actions upon the return of 'Rogue Force' from Brazil. The paratrooper saw Law about to say something before he was cut off as the helicopter started to pitch upwards, the pilot beginning to slow the aircraft down. The move caused Ripcord's green eyes to swing out towards the ground below, just barely revealing a series of various tents covered in camouflage netting that littered a somewhat large area of the desert. So this was NESTEGG. Ripcord gently shrugged his shoulder, the action having the same effect as gunshot for Covergirl as she instantly jolted awake. The female tanker shot her suddenly alert eyes towards Ripcord, with a quizzical look on her face. In response he only offered a single nod towards the open cargo door of the helicopter as the pilot began to slowly descend down to a section of sand that was circled off with several green burning flares.  
  
  
"Sir, the Blackhawks are arriving." A young looking MP said as he walked up to a man standing over a radioman in the equipment filled command tent.  
"Excellent." Psyche Out responded with a nod of confirmation to the soldier. As the MP returned the nod and headed towards the exit of the ten, the officer reached just in front of him, tapping the shoulder of the soldier seated at the communications station. The radio man didn't avert his eyes, the only sign of recognition coming in the form of sliding one of the earpieces on his headset forward just enough to expose his ear.  
"Get HQ on the horn and let them know that the troops have arrived Sparks." Psyche Out said before he turned and headed out of the tent. The MP held the heavy canvas flap open as Psyche Out left the air conditioned confines of tent and stepped out into the blazing mid-day sun of the Saudi Arabian desert, slipping his softcap over his blonde hair as he strode purposefully towards the camp's make-shift helipad. In the nearby distance he saw a Blackhawk in the final stages of descent while several more circled overhead. After long walk across the sizable camp, the officer finally reached a position close to the helipad. His blue eyes gazed out across the open expanse of the sand, catching sight of several figures approaching, any details were blurred by the heat waves radiating off of the ground and the sand grains being blown around by rotor wash of the UH-60. After a few moments of their trek, the group became more visible. Out of the eleven troops that had disembarked from the helicopter, his eyes were immediately drawn to seven of the individuals. They walked with a slow pace, moving forward in a tight abreast line. The group was made up of four soldiers and three crewmen, each bristling with their combat gear, looking as if they could deploy at the slightest notice will minimal preparation. As Psyche Out took in the details of the group, the Blackhawk lifted free of the ground just before it turned and pitched forward, zooming over the officer's position. So, these troops were to be his command.  
  
  
The landing zone wasn't supposed to be hot, but they wouldn't take any chances, knowing what was supposed to be and what was were two different things. Each of them strode purposefully as they'd exited the Blackhawk, visually assessing the area. She noticed out of the corner of her eye how the teams were already beginning to form, NESTEGG, SPYGLASS, HUNTER, KILLER, THUNDER. Once again she diverted her eyes from the men that were to make up THUNDER to focus on her real team, as they walked straight through the center of camp, taking note of the layout.   
Dios Mio. Zap said, to break the silence. I thought the humidity was bad. Dry heat sucks too.   
High and hard. Heavy Metal added, taking a drink from one of his canteens. Her eyes immediately shot towards Ripcord, still wearing his sleeves free, covering his arm. She didn't know what was making him more self-conscious, the scar itself, or just the fact that he'd been wounded to begin with.   
She smiled as they met up with Law, who'd just jogged over to meet with his new team, NESTEGG, her smile fading as another young looking Lieutenant exited the tent he had been standing near. She drew a sharp breath as she saw Law's right arm start to raise, most likely due to force of habit. Ripcord had been closest to him, and grabbed the M.P.'s arm before he could finish popping up the salute.   
We're in a combat zone. She heard Ripcord remind him, as he visually checked the surrounding areas. Law nodded, as did Psyche Out, before Ripcord fell back in line with the rest of the team. She'd nearly made the same mistake herself back at A10, near saluting Steeler who'd reminded her with a wink that she may as well draw a big target on his back. No need to advertise to the enemy who was in charge.   
  
They'd found a spot, as usual, off to themselves, using one of the large tents as shade. Hotseat motioned in a circle with two fingers, causing them to form a tight circle around him as they sat or knelt down on the sand. "Okay people..." He began, once again making her smile. He probably still didn't know all of their names. "I want to get this out of the way now, because we all know once the shit hits the fan, there won't be time for anything but reaction. In case I don't get to say it, remember caution is key over here. I know we're just off a furlough, don't let that make you lose your edge." He took another moment to glance at each of the team members individually before standing, adding "Eyes open. We best check in with our squads." He didn't have to add it, they just knew. They'd meet back when they could. She watched as they broke off, Hotseat and Heavy Metal heading one way, Ripcord, Zap, Fast Draw and Repeater the other. It just felt strange to be breaking off, to watch all of them leave. Ripcord took a quick look back, offering a wink and a thumbs up, to which she responded with a sign she hoped he could interpret. It almost looked like the hang loose sign they'd picked up in Hawaii, a closed fist with extended thumb and pinky, but her sign had the index finger extended as well. She flashed it quick, feeling better herself for having said it. He smiled in return before turning and jogging to catch up with his three teammates.   
  
The young tanker approached just as she'd turned to leave herself, both teams disappearing from her sight.. "Covergirl, right?" He asked. He wore an army branch tape, and the subdued rank of a sergeant, but still, she knew already, the man was a total FNG. She kept her eyes forward, as she continued walking, him falling in step next to her. "Name's Breckinridge.... well, Thunder. We're on the THUNDER team together, kind of easy to remember the name, you know?" He kidded, with a grin. She still kept her eyes forward, nodding a greeting to him. She detected a Kentucky accent from the man, having recognized it well from her time at Knox. "Met the others on the jet, Grand Slam, Paden, White, Berard" He continued to rattle off names, oblivious to the fact she wasn't paying attention. "And the shirt, Long Range. They call him the Knockout Man, supposed to be the best there is. She rolled her eyes at his words 'supposed to be.' England was supposed to be a simple assignment, Brazil, a basic recon. She didn't take stock in anything that was 'supposed to be.' You're on the Wolverine, right?" He paused for a second, still not getting any response. "Anyway, I just wanted to introduce myself. Top's been itchin' to get the team together, think he has everyone else. She could see about a dozen figures, all in jumpsuits, congregating around the two sluggers and two Wolverines. Her eyes brightened when she saw the two platforms, the hot sun scorching down on the drab steel. Good old Wolverines.   
  
And this must be Covergirl." Long Range stated, as the two soldiers walked up. She nodded, taking stock of the team. Grand Slam she'd seen around before. He was at A10. Drake, Paden, she'd seen them around the motor pool. Other than that, the faces were new. "Vehicle assignments are as follows, Grand Slam, Thunder, you're on the Sluggers. Covergirl and I, Wolverines. Paden, White, mechanics. Reloaders will be..." His voice trailed off. She'd heard the important part. Wolverine. She zoned back in, taking notes when he briefed them on how he wanted the grids to be broken down, and on a few different scenarios about the incoming convoy itself. The briefing itself took approximately an hour, her spending another two hours checking and rechecking the Wolverine, going over some of the desert modifications with Paden first, before performing the standard vehicle pre-check on her own. She finished with a simple 'me and you, buddy' to the craft, tapping the top of the walkway before climbing down. Now it was back to waiting. She ignored the 'for this assignment, THUNDER is your team' comment Long Range had made when she'd accidental referred to the Rogues as her team, still choosing to wait with them over the armor boys. He was wrong. THUNDER was her assignment, not her team. She'd work with them, follow the new top, cover any of them that needed it, do her part, and hoped they'd do theirs. Then, if no one blew it, they could all go home, find out the mission never took place, and she could go back to being Rogue Force. After the assignment, she knew THUNDER team would disperse, they wouldn't hang out, wouldn't grab a few beers and talk about the old days, at best they'd maybe give a quick nod if they passed in the hallway. That wasn't a team.  
  
The waiting game was the worst, several soldiers using the time to play some frisbee or touch football. She smiled, thinking back to the Navy boys on the beach in Hawaii. Zap'd brought a deck of cards, that helped pass a little of the time, as the day stretched into night. Out of force of habit, they slept in shifts, two of them awake at all times, changing off at two hour intervals. A second day passed, uneventful as the first... Thunder, the Green Wonder, as Fast Draw coined him stopped by a few times, once with Grand Slam. Grand Slam was quiet, kept to himself, plus he'd been through A10, which sort of made him okay. Still not a Rogue, but better than the Fucking New Guy. He may have had a lot of time in the service, but not much of it was spent in the field. Night fall started bringing on more feelings of caged tiger syndrome from the team. She wondered if that's why the top brass would drop teams in early make them wait, wanting something, anything to happen, just to have something to do, or just to get things over with. She pictured some general somewhere high up knowing exactly where the convoy was, when it would strike, and then deciding to send everyone over days in advance. Realistically, she knew that wasn't the case, the convoy would get there when it got there, but it was just easier to blame something tangible.   
  
It was almost daylight as she finished her shift of alertness for Rogue Force. Almost time for the sun to come up. She reveled in the last few minutes of the cold darkness, not looking forward to another day of the blistering sun. Zap was right. Dry heat sucked too. In Brazil, the humidity clung to you, filling your lungs with moist air that almost made you feel like you were drowning. In Saudi, the hot air sucked the moisture right out of them, making you feel like they'd shatter if you took too deep a breath in. She thought back to the perfect median which was Hawaii, warm but breezy, neither hot nor humid, just perfect. Her thoughts were interrupted by the call from one of the soldiers near the center of the camp, Satellite had just confirmed a visual on the approaching convoy.


	3. Chapter 3

Psyche-Out sat calmly inside the tent, listening to the reports streaming in tracking the convoy and status checks from the different teams, Sparks monitoring the stations as well. He and Sparks had been working together at NESTEGG since day one, making sure everything was fully operational. Still no word of a visual from SPYGLASS, he knew the teams had to be getting restless. He only hoped the waiting didn't make them careless as well.   
  
  
JACKAL IN POSITION, SAY AGAIN, JACKAL IN POSITION. Steeler called into the radio. Heavy Metal waited in the Mauler, and tried to swallow the thick lump which sat in his throat, seemingly choking him. The waiting was the worst part. Not knowing what was going to happen, how bad it was going to be. At least he'd have the Mauler this time, some sort of armor, of firepower. It wasn't like Brazil, when they were out in the open. That was insane. He didn't sign on for that, didn't sign on for any of this. If it wasn't for the hazard pay plus the fact that it seemed to impress Amy so much. He smiled and relaxed a little. Amy. His girl for almost two years now. He finally got the nerve up to ask her to marry him when they had the 48 hour pass, visiting her in her shoebox apartment in the lower east side of Brooklyn. It wasn't the best of neighborhoods, but it was no where near as bad as the section where he grew up. He promised her that when they got married, he'd take her away from the city to the suburbs. No more apartments, maybe a small house, a little yard Long Island, Connecticut, even New Jersey. Somewhere close enough that she could still visit her parents, but far enough away from the noise and the crowded streets. He knew how miserable she was with Brooklyn life, how much she wanted out. That's what kept him going. Still, as much as his heart beat for her, it raced with fear as he sat silently in the Mauler with McMillian, his driver. Waiting, wishing the fight would start, so it could be over.   
  
  
HUNTER, KILLER, GOOD TO GO. The lieutenant called into the radio. Was about fucking time, Fast Draw thought to himself as Falcon then turned his attention towards his men.   
Team HUNTER, form up on me. The Lieutenant called with a wave, causing the numerous soldiers to gather around as he pulled out a series of photographs. Fast Draw tapped his foot against the sand in rapid succession as the El-tee pointed out where they'd be dropping in, right after the airstrike. He called for Repeater and Long Arm to go first down the ropes and secure the area, causing Fast Draw to land a playful punch on the big man's arm. Lucky bastard.   
Once the area is secure The lieutenant continued. We'll be splitting into two teams. Alpha Hunter will consist of Long Arm, Fast Draw, Wilke, Hopewell, Prata.. He rattled another series of six names, none of which he recognized. Commanded by Leatherneck. Bravo Hunter will consist of Hardball, Grunt, Flash, Repeater, Haegar, Cowles, Owen.. five more names he didn't recognize And myself. One last thing, boys, no survivors. He reminded them. Eliminate all hostiles. Understood? Oh yeah, he understood. Hunter hunt em down, kill em all. Fast Draw still twitched his foot, not out of nerves, but more out of anticipation as he and Repeater waited by the choppers. Satellite had made a visual. They were on ready alert. Soon as SPYGLASS confirmed, they'd be out, theyd be in, the terrorists would go down.   
First in, Big Man! he reminded Repeater. First in, first kills. You get em! Two shots, you hittin them, them hittin the ground! Then its all about Alpha, all about Alpha Hunter. The banter helped steady his nerves. Repeater never seemed to have that problem. He was like a statue, always had been, for as long as Fast Draw was teamed up with him, even as far back as the armory in Nevada. Not that he could blame him. The blonde nurse with the great tits back in Hawaii explained what happened, in Nam. How his unit was wiped out. Fast Draw didn't want to think about that, think about his team, the Rogues, being wiped out. Even Ripcord. Yeah, it was fun getting under his skin sometimes, the boy had to learn to loosen up a bit was all, still, he hoped him and Zap were going to pull this off. Things tend to get hairy with all that demolitions shit. Not that he was worried, or going soft on them. Heavy Metal, Hotseat, he knew Pops would be okay, had a good head on his shoulders, he'd been around the block a few times, but Heavy Metal. Boy seemed so green, it was like his set hadn't even dropped yet. Then there was Covergirl. He let half a smile cross his face. At least his babe would be hanging back for this one, not up in the front lines. She should be okay, even without her white knight. Still, he would have felt better if one of them were with her, just in case.   
What was taking so long? Stupid convoy. His foot twitched a bit faster, now itching to get in there. He made eye contact again with Repeater, who simply nodded. Fuck! What was taking so goddamn long? He grabbed his rifle a little tighter. Fuck, just send us in get the show on.   
  
  
THUNDER IN POSITION, SAY AGAIN, THUNDER IN POSITION. Long Range called into the radio. She cut the engine of the Wolverine beneath her after pulling into position, and thought back to the team's parting. Ripcord had given her his usual make it out in one piece Courtney statement, reassuringly squeezing her forearm. She told him the same, flashing him another quick sign before he and Zap ran off. Still felt wrong to all be split up. Hotseat and Heavy Metal heading towards the MOBATs and the Maulers; Ripcord, Repeater, Zap, and Fast Draw heading for the choppers. She wanted the same for all of them, make it out in one piece. Thunder had flanked her on the left in the Slugger. She gave a quick glance over to him, and signed for him to cut the engine. They may still be there for hours, depending on the convoy. They'd let them know. He nodded in response, indicating he wanted to check the vehicle. She didn't acknowledge his signs. She would have preferred to have Grand Slam and his Slugger near by. At least he'd been at A10. Thunder, she had no idea of how green he was, not taking the time to ask. It didn't matter. There was no way she was going to baby-sit, not once the convoy showed up.   
She gave one more thought about her team, seeing Ripcord's warm green eyes before turning her attention back to the Wolverine, going through one last status check on the engines, tracks and platform. Everything seemed in order. She clenched and unclenched her fists, practicing flipping the missile covers up and down. Once again, she took the torn Cobra insignia from her rucksack, squeezing it in her palm. She didn't really believe in luck, good or bad. Murphy was a different story, but the action was familiar, familiarity brought comfort.   
She took a quick sip of water from her canteen, still conserving as much as possible, a habit she picked up back in Brazil when supplies were running short. No word yet on the number of trucks or types of vehicles. The convoy couldn't reach the camp. It was carrying high end weapons, that was all she knew, weapons that could be used against her team. They weren't going to reach camp. No matter what, it wasn't going to happen. THUNDER would hit first, probably the same time GOD would show up, the airstirke. It was going to get loud. She gave a half smirk just thinking about it. She twitched her one knee impatiently, clenching and unclenching fists, ready to start up, to go on the first signal. Minutes drifted into hours, still no word to move. C'mon, C'mon, C'mon She whispered, focusing on the radio in front of her, waiting for the word. Let's make it loud, boys, let's make it loud.  
  
"NESTEGG, this is SPYGLASS. We have a visual on the target. They are entering the ravine. Send in THUNDER, now."   
Hold up, hold up, hold up Was the next call over the radio from Long Range. Tango Eight Four Tango Eight Four, hold position. Eight Four, that was Thunder. Sure enough when she checked, he was getting ready to jump the gun, literally. They had to wait for word from NESTEGG. That was the worst part of being armor. More than once the relay time fucked up a strike in one way or the other. The eyes would call the shots, relay the info to command, command then relayed it to the armor boys. Precious seconds would be lost while the brass decided from their safe vantage point what to relay to the tankers. Covergirl kicked the engine of the Wolverine over, bringing up the platform's pop up display at near the same time. She watched the pop up screen intently, beginning to see the moving targets. C'mon, NESTEGG, call was made. give the word, give the word, send us in. She said impatiently.  
THUNDER this is NESTEGG. On SPYGLASS mark, say again, SPYGLASS mark. She flipped the covers of the first four missiles to ready. All other sounds stopped. Had she noticed the approaching choppers it would have distracted her from the task at hand, stopping the convoy.   
"THUNDER! THUNDER! Fire at grid square Echo-Charlie Eight-Six-Four-Five-Seven-Seven-Two-Three!"   
"Confirmed SPYGLASS! Volley away!" She launched three of the twelve missiles, hearing nothing but the air being pierced by missile, leaving behind a slight screaming sound, succeeded as always by an explosion, this was no exception. Three missiles, two hits, lead convoy truck. Motherfuckers weren't going anywhere.   
"THUNDER! Repeat! Repeat! Repeat!" She flipped more of the covers back, depressing missiles four and five to the same grid. Another hit, and yet a bigger explosion heard in the distance. Things got loud.   
Holy Shit, did you see that? From Grand Slam. She smirked, it was the first word's she'd heard him say, even back at the armory, he was kind of shy, kept to himself. Long Range seemed to be kicking ass as well, calling in another hit.   
Next up and closing fast were the two Ghoststrikers that screamed along low altitude, kicking up sand and debris in their wake. Things just got louder.   
SPYGLASS, Pull back, pull back! From NESTEGG.   
THUNDER, I have HiSS APCs, I have HiSS APCs. Shit! Not only were they losing their eyes, they now had the threat of incoming Vipers.   
Came the last call from SPYGLASS before they pulled back. VISUAL, Heat-Vipers, Again, HEAT Vipers. FUCK! Even worse. They had AT missiles. She shot a worried glance horizon, pausing for a moment. GOD was still reporting releasing heat.   
Tango Eight Two, Eight Two, Repeat! Eight two, that was her. She focused back on the Cobra Convoy, sending two more missiles screaming before heading closer towards the ravine for a better visual. The man had done a good job with the HiSSs, but the convoy was starting to disperse. Tango Eight one, Eight one, falling back for reload. Eight three cover, Eight two, Eight four hold position. Three missiles left, just three, would take a few minutes for Eight One to reload. Her next shot would take two of them. Dammit. She switched on her headset.   
Eight Three, Eight Three, backing up, they're trying to swing around, rear of the convoy, again, target to the back of the convoy.   
Thunder called back from the radio.   
Fuck the grid! Use a visual! He was hesitating. No survivors, Eight Four, She reminded him.   
The call came from over the radio. Grand Slam. "Shell artillery, longer range. He moves in, he might as well volley blind, he's not gonna hit nothing. She liked him better when he was shy and silent, but he was right. Artillery was different than armor. She knew armor. Thunder knew his shit. He could hold his own. Still, it did her no good, without a pair of eyes, blind volleying is all he could do anyways. She waited until she caught the movement of Long Range's Wolverine before firing her final missiles. One vehicle destroyed. One disabled. Fuck, just a disable. Time to reload.   
  
  
Fast Draw cracked his neck one more time, looking out the front of the Tomahawk chopper towards the Alpha Hunter shirt, Leatherneck, the sarge in charge. Can't go wrong with a big marine, he figured. If anyone knew what they were doing, it was a big marine. The memories of his three fuck ups from the last mission played briefly in his mind. The static line jump especially, he wasn't going to take the same chance with the fast rope. He knew it was serious, knew how dangerous even it could be. A fall from that height was deadly. Once he was on the ground, he knew he'd be fine, clean sweep, kill em all, let Satan sort em out. He took a final glance out the window, seeing the explosions off in the distance, nudging the soldier next to his left, Wilke, he thought he said his name was. He nodded towards the ground below, patting his weapon and giving the man a thumbs up. A close call between the chopper and an RPG wiped the grin off his face as he once again turned towards the serious task at hand. RPGs the shit was hitting the fan, and worse... it was hitting the chopper.  
Fast Draw clung to the webbing but was still thrown forwards, then back, knocking into the soldier sitting beside him. It was almost the same feeling he'd gotten when his Bronco was rear-ended, with one huge exception. That was on the ground. Their bird had been hit.  
Christ! Zero-One, Zero-One, RPG, we're hit He heard the co-pilot say into the radio, followed by a second explosion which again rocked the back of the craft, filling the cabin with even more thick smoke. Zero-One, Going down. Tail rotor lost, rear main rotor damage The commotion in the back combined with the deafening warning sirens kept him from making out the rest of the transmission as the craft pitched backwards, descending into a slow spin.   
Heads down, heads down! Leatherneck yelled out as they braced for impact. He had to briefly laugh to himself, a chuckle mostly brought on by nerves. The old put your head between your knees so you can kiss your ass goodbye joke. He felt the hull of the chopper begin to vibrate as a high-speed whining noise was heard. His stomach lurched into his throat as he strained to keep it together, keep himself from getting sick, a battle the soldier next to him quickly lost. His mind instantly flashed back to Hawaii, to trying to out drink Skyboy during a poker game. He'd woken up that night with this same feeling, dizzy and sick. Usually his room would spin a lot faster than the sinking helicopter though, he could almost count the slow rotations. He tried to ignore the sights and sounds, convince himself that's all this was, a drunken haze. He wasn't really in the back of a chopper about to crash. The room was spinning because he was drunk, not because of a lost tail rudderHe squinted his eyes tighter closed, the sudden impact with the ground wiping any doubt from his head about what was going on.  
Fast Draw wasn't quite sure how the chopper hit. He remembered being jerked towards the tail before being thrown forward then against the side of the hull as the craft finally came to a stop. Opening his eyes, he realized the craft was upright. Blood trickled from his lip where he'd bitten it, while another soldier he didn't recognize was on top of him, the man's shoulder digging into his chin. Helping the soldier off of him, Fast Draw saw that the similarly aged-man's arm dangling at a strange angle, almost as if his elbow had bent the wrong way. Grimacing, he turned his head to the side, the view becoming even worse. Wilke's eyes were open wide, his helmet nowhere in sight. Fast Draw could see the something poking at the skin towards the front of his neck, a flow of blood gurgling in the soldier's throat, some pulsing from his mouth in reflex. He was just inches away, his head snapped violently enough to dislocate his spinal cord from the base of his skull. Fuck, that could've been him, easily. A chill ran through him as he finally lost his fight against getting sick, the combination of bile and blood running down his chin and staining his BDU's.   
Holy shit, Wilke! The soldier on him called out, pushing off of Fast Draw and grabbing his friend. Once disturbed, Wilkes lifeless head dropped to the side unceremoniously before swaying slightly back and forth. The soldier nearby cried frantically above the noise of the still blaring sirens. Wilke's Hurt!   
Fast Draw corrected softly, aware the soldier would not be able to hear him. He's down, not hurt. Trying to stand, he felt like his own spinal cord was being compressed together, the dull ache becoming a sharp pain as he was finally able to drag the man with the broken arm off the downed bird and away from the scene inside. All in all they'd lost three men in the crash including the bird's co-pilot. Counting Hopewell, the soldier he'd helped, four were wounded, but he couldn't worry about them now. Instead, he wiped his bloodied mouth with the back of his sleeve and readied his weapon. These motherfuckers were going down.


	4. Chapter 4

Repeater looked up, his eyes breaking their long stare at the deck of the Tomahawk as Falcon, the el-tee of the HUNTER and KILLER teams and the leader of this particular element, started to shout out the all too familiar commands for a fastrope into a hot LZ. The big machine gunner rose from his seat, grabbing the end of thick nylon as he went. Working quickly and letting his air assault training take over, he quickly attached a snap-link to a looped end of the rope before connecting it to a heavy duty hook mounted in the roof of the helicopter's cabin. As soon as he tossed the rope free of the aircraft, Falcon barked out the commands.  
"Go! Go! Go!" The officer shouted, starting his words before the ropes had even uncoiled their length to the sand below. Good. He wasn't stupid. With all the ground fire, they needed to get out of the hovering Tomahawk as fast as possible. Repeater quickly grabbed the rope, pinching the nylon between his boot soles as he began the swift descent to the ground below. He and Grunt landed within a few heartbeats, both immediately unslinging their weapons and looking for cover.   
"Gun emplacement! Six o'clock! Twenty meters!" Repeater bellowed out in the same instant that he dropped to knee and began to pour suppressive fire into the moderately-sized sandbag structure. The door gunners on the helicopter had managed to keep the enemy gunners away from the two 12.7mm coaxial machine guns. The big machine gunner intended to keep it that way. As soon as Grunt stepped into his firing arc he stood, still firing bursts from his M-60 at the emplacement as he and his fellow soldier sprinted towards the bunker, both ignoring the cracking sounds of near misses that filled their ears. The more atheltic and light loaded Grunt reached the target first, jumping up onto the sandbag wall and firing a series of quick bursts from his M-16 down into the enemy position. A second later the soldier jumped down behind the protection of the barrier, followed closely by Repeater clearing the wall in a single leap. Without even pausing to catch their breath, the two soldiers both rose their eyes and weapons over the barrier and began to give covering fire to their oncoming teammates. Repeater took a quick stock of the situation as he continued to rake suppressive fire over the area. Most importantly was the fact that the helicopter was still in the air and still in the fight, it's doorgunners and it's chin turret seeking out anything that wasn't in desert BDUs. Falcon and his RTO, Owen, had been the next two down, both firing off hasty bursts at any contact that appeared as they too headed for the gun emplacement. The next pair had just hit the ground and were getting their bearings. Good. Nobody was hit so far. Just as the officer and the RTO had reached the hole, heard his headset crackle to life.  
"Christ! Zero-One, Zero-Once, RPG, we're hit" A panicked voice came over the channels, the sound of warning alarms blaring through the transmission. Before anyone could respond to the call, the same voice, only more fearful, came over the frequency again. "Zero-One, Going down. Auto-rotation is failing, tail rotor lost, rear main rotor damage, we're in a slow descent and rotation. I say agin, Ze-  
"Damnit." Repeater cursed under his breath. Half of HUNTER just went down. Repeater forced the transmission from his mind, dwelling on it wouldn't help, it would only screw with his actions. The pilot said it was low velocity. He himself had survived a low velocity helo crash in 'Nam. Hopefully Alpha HUNTER would be the same way. Shortly after the transmission had ceased the last pair had hit the ground, immediately provoking the Tomahawk above them to peel away. The downing of the other helo had spooked command. No more CAS at this point. Again, Repeater forced the thoughts from his head. He couldn't afford to be distracted. He was the machine gun. He could be difference between somebody going home or somebody going home in a black bag. A few moments longer and the final pair of soldiers had reached the safety of bunker, which immediately caused Falcon to speak up.  
"Listen up, once we clear this area we head towards our rendezvous, dropping everything in sight. Let's do it." The green beret spoke, his voice barely clearing the din of the firefight that raged around them. As the minutes passed, the resistance started to slowly thin out before it stopped altogether, the area finally cleared of hostiles. The group of soldiers carefully made their way out of the gun emplacement, each with their weapon still up, all of them smart enough to not let their guard down. Once the area had been double checked to assure that all the terrorists in the immediate area were dead, Falcon snapped his fingers three times before using hand signals to move the team out.   
  
The soldiers had arranged themselves in a loose column, proceeding towards their target in an overwatch pattern that was running parrallel to one of the roads that criss-crossed the large camp. The group encounted hostiles with an alarming consistancy; however, the density of the vast number of tents kept nearly every firefight at close range while masking the approach of the team. Appearently the terrorists had expected them to use the roads since most of the resistance came from groups that had obviously been waiting in ambush at the roadside, their backs totally exposed to the team of Joes. Considering the fact that Repeater could tell from the sheer number of hostiles encounted that intel had grossly underestimated their numbers; the team had done surprisingly well, the tight conditions and abundance of visual cover allowing them to not lose a single man. Repeater had stopped trying to count the number of times that they had engaged the enemy, each time the pointman relaying the enemy's position to Falcon who then gave a rough plan of who would do what. However, one transmission did immediately spark more than the normal amount of concern from the big machine gunner.  
"Sir, we got a big clearing up ahead. Looks like it got hit by clusterbombs, there's a shit load of impact craters in the area. I can see movement in the holes." The voice of Grunt whispered over the team's channel.  
"Damnit." Falcon returned, his voice sounded slightly disheartened. "Alright, that area's practically right on top of the rendezvous point, so we can't bypass it or call in arty, we have to take it. Repeater, Hardball, get up here." Repeater acknowledged the orders before he started to low crawl towards Grunt's and Falcon's position; shortly after he arrived, the trio was joined by Hardball, a tall and lanky black grenadier. "Here's the deal," Falcon spoke slowly, as if trying to test run the plan in his head as he spoke. "Hardball, I need you to hit a few of those holes to throw 'em in disarray. Once that's happened, I'll throw some smoke between us and them. Repeater, you'll lay down covering fire while the team head towards the set of holes closest to the smoke. Once we've dealt with some of them and we've got cover then we'll take out the rest of them." The big machine gunner quickly crawled off and found a semi-hidden spot to fire from while the grenadier had reached his own point from which to attack. After a short moment of waiting, the officer gave the command. He heard the high pitched pop before a dull explosion blossomed from one of the impact craters, the product of the M-203 grenade launcher slung under the barrel of Hardball's M-16. The first grenade was followed shortly by a second then a third. Before the echoing of the third had ceased, two objects where hurled out into the clearing, each beginning to spew forth thin white smoke. That was his sign. Repeater immediately opened up on the bomb craters, making sure that nothing would dare to pop its head up. With the protection of the M-60's suppressive fire, the members of the team began to rush forward, each trying to get to a series of craters just on the safe side of the smoke. Grunt went, followed by Falcon, then Owen, next was Haegar. It was his turn. Still laying down a hellish field of fire, the big machine gunner stood before he sprinted forward. The weapon's bolt clicked empty as he reached one of the make-shift foxholes, instantly causing him to jump in before ducking his body down and out of exposure. As he went about loading another belt into his machine gun, he noticed that he'd ended up in the same hole as Falcon and Owen. As he slapped the cover back down on the M-60's chamber, he heard the all too familiar sound of an RPG-7 being launched. Before he could react he saw an explosion raise between Hardball and Cowles. The reservist was thrown backwards by the blast, while the grenadier fell forward. Everything processed too fast for him to catch all of it. The arterial bleeding that pumped like a fountain from a ragged and gapping hole in Hardball's calf. The twitching of Cowles' feet. Flash running out towards their two teammates. Repeater shook himself out of his daze. He couldn't dwell. He was the machine gunner. He could make the difference. He wouldn't lose his squad again. Ignoring the snapping sounds of near misses and the animal-like cries of pain from Hardball, he turned his body towards the hostiles and raised both himself and his weapon into the fray. He raked the area with fire, not letting his finger off the trigger as the 7.62mm rounds were spat out of the M-60, the bullets turning anyone that didn't duck down into a mangled mass of crimson before dropping into a loose heap to the sands below. Repeater still kept firing, smoke starting to raise from not only the muzzle but the barrel itself too. The burn of the hot shells and links coliding with his thigh didn't pull him away from his field of fire. After what felt like an enternity but couldn't have been more that a few seconds due the fact that he'd never let off the trigger, the bolt started to dry fire, his belt expended. It wasn't until then that he'd realized that the wounded animal-like scream had been coming from himself rather than Hardball. He quickly regained control of himself, shutting his mouth before he slid down into the crater again. As he went about reloading, he ignored the wide-eyed gaze of Owen, instead searching for signs of his hit teammates. He saw Haegar, the medic, dragging Hardball's quaking body towards another hole, a tourniquet tied around his calf, just below his knee. Repeater averted his eyes from the sight of the grenadier. A tourniquet. He'd survive, that dressing would assure that. His lower leg wouldn't. The next thing to catch his eye was the form of Cowles, still laying on his back, out in the open. His team wouldn't leave wounded men behind. Cowles was gone. He also saw Flash off in a hole by himself, popping up every once in a while to fire at the hostiles. As the big machine gunner finished loading the next belt, he stood again, firing on the still remaining hostiles. He hoped to hell that the others got there soon.  
  
  
Ripcord did his best to focus on the tents and other hastily erected structures that littered the sandy ground a mere eighty feet below. The task was made even harder over the steady beat of the Tomahawk's armored rotor blades and the clatter of small arms fire that sounded out from every direction. As his hardened green eyes searched the landscape he first spotted several columns of thick black smoke that rose into the cloudless sky from various points around the terrorist camp. The majority of the damage was centered on two very specific points of the camp, one cluster of oil-rich smoke rose from an area, which was supposed to be a motorpool according to the maps of the complex, while another series drifted up from a large clearing that should have been the helipad. Good. GOD had done their work. Hopefully all four of the terrorist's Mi-24 helicopters and their modest armored force were successfully destroyed by the airstrikes. The armor didn't worry the paratrooper that much, rather the Hind-Ds did. He'd seen pictures from Afghanistan in situations where the Soviet forces had used the dual-role helicopters as anti-infantry air support. The rebels had loosely resembled chopped hamburger. The human body simply wasn't designed to absorb 12.7mm cannon rounds. Ripcord's train of thought was shattered as a new, more unnerving noise was heard over the sounds of battle. The piercing scream of one of an aircraft's warning tones.  
"Sonuvabitch!" The helicopter's pilot shouted out in a thick Southern accent, his anger allowing his deep pitched voice to carry over the various sounds. "Sonsabitchs took my cannon hydraulics 'at! Get on dem guns an' give 'em hell boys!" With the orders of the grizzled reservist warrant officer, the cabin of the Joe helicopter grew much louder as the M-60D machine guns mounted just inside the doors of the aircraft opened up, spraying out brass shell casings as they rained their 7.62mm rounds on the terrorists below.   
"Team! Prep for insertion!" Goldfine, a staff sergeant reservist and the leader of KILLER Bravo, shouted out to the five other soldiers aboard the aircraft as it pitched back in preparation to go into a hover. Goldfine threw a sign across the cabin to Blackburne, another Joe reservist, as the Tomahawk finished its flaring deceleration move. As soon as the aircraft was mostly level, Goldfine and Blackburne both stood, withdrawing thick nylon ropes from under their respective seats on the opposite sides of the airframe. Working quickly, the two soldiers attached snap-links to a looped end of the rope, then secured the rope to heavy duty rings mounted on the roof of the cabin before kicking the remainder of the olive drab ropes free of the Tomahawk, letting gravity unravel them as they fell to the sandy ground below. "Alright, by the numbers men, once we hi-" Goldfine never finished his sentence. The dull cabin exploded with color as crimson sprays erupted from both Goldfine and the left door gunner. The soldiers watched in horror as the gunner slumped lifelessly forward in his restraints while the momentum of the rounds carried Goldfine's limp body into the lap of a hysterical Sergeant Addams.   
"He's dead! The Sarge is dead!" Addams screamed as he stared wide-eyed at the surprised pair of motionless eyes that returned his fear filled gaze.  
"Fuck." Ripcord grumbled as he slipped free of his restraints and reached an arm forward to pull the NCO's corpse free of Addams' lap, the body landing heavily on the deck while the paratrooper wiped away a gout of blood that had landed on the right side of his face. Addams was shaking badly, his pale face locked on the lifeless eyes of Goldfine. He was useless to the team in this state. Ripcord took a firm grip on the suspenders of Addams' ALICE gear and gave the junior NCO a violent shake. "Sergeant!" Ripcord shouted into the Ranger's face, causing the soldier's eyes to snap to the younger Specialist's face. "Listen to me Sergeant. This war. This is what soldiers do. Shit happens. You're no good to us down there like this. Now either you snap the fuck out of it and take command like you're supposed to or keep your sorry ass on this bird when we leave."   
"You guys had better git your asses on the ground quick, sonsabitches'll be on us faster 'an flys on shit an' now I'm jest down ta the starboard sixty!" The pilot shouted back into the cabin. They were out of time.  
"Alright people here's the deal!" Ripcord shouted, pointing to people as he called them. "Shaw, with me on this rope! Zap, Blackburne, on that rope! Hit the ground running! Stay together! Find cover and fire at anything that moves!" Ripcord waited the briefest second to see a collective nod from the three soldiers then reached for the rope. He quickly pinched the rope between his boots, loosely closing his hands around the thick nylon an instant before he pushed away from the airframe. The swift descent rated among the longest seconds of the paratrooper's life. He hated this air assault shit. He barely knew how to do it. He couldn't return fire. The pressure between his feet was the only thing between making it down safe or falling eighty feet to the ground below. Everything went into slow motion. The clatter of automatic weapons fire, the air ruffling the fabric of his desert BDUs, the spinning of the rotor blades on the shadow of the helicopter. Everything. Then it happened. He hit the ground. Reality snapped back into place. He was in a war zone. "Cover! UAZ! Two o'clock! Thirty meters!" Ripcord shouted out in chopped words to Blackburne as he immediately broke into a sprint towards the relative safety of the Soviet made UAZ 469b utility car. As the two soldiers ran, Blackburne sprayed the enemy positions with fire from his M-249 Squad Automatic Weapon while Ripcord took hasty shots at exposed troops with his M-16. Some bodies would fall, some wouldn't. The paratrooper didn't care as his hardened eyes quickly lined up on forms of the terrorists in the sights of his assault rifle. He could worry about his sins later. Right now staying alive and doing his job were his only concerns.  
With a final dive, Ripcord hit the ground, kicking up a cloud of sand as he landed prone behind the UAZ, keeping the small jeep-like vehicle between him and most of the terrorists in the area. Immediately upon reaching his goal, Ripcord spun around and rose to a knee, training his rifle back towards the drop point. The first thing to catch the paratrooper's sight was three figures running towards the UAZ, each firing into their surroundings. Good. Everybody made it down. Even Addams. The small feeling of success was quickly banished as he finally took an estimated stock of the number of hostiles as he provided covering fire for his approaching teammates. It didn't look good, around a dozen terrorists still were dotted around the area. And unfortunately all the stupid ones were already dead. The ones that remained obviously fully understood the concept of cover and concealment. Ripcord pushed the negative thoughts away as best he could. He'd learned a long time ago that whining didn't work in the real world. The Joes and the terrorists kept trading hasty shots at the other's emplacements with out any sign of either side hitting anything until the other three Joes finally reached the cover of the UAZ. It was the moment that the paratrooper had been waiting for. All friendlies were behind cover. "Blackburne! Addams! Covering fire! Zap! Shaw! Grenades!" Ripcord barked out in rapid fire succession while he freed an anti-personnel grenade from it's position on the side of an ammo pouch. "Now!" He ordered as he pulled the pin away and forcefully tossed the grenade in a high arc over the UAZ, Zap and Shaw following suit as the team was rewarded with three dull explosions within seconds. Before the sound of the grenades had faded, Ripcord's headset came to life, the paratrooper straining to hear the transmission over the hail of gunfire that erupted between his people and the remaining hostiles in the area.   
"This is Bird Zero-Four, we are Ar-Tee-Bee, I have sustained damage and can not stay on station, out." The pilot of the Tomahawk called out over the open channel. Ripcord shot a quick glance skyward as the twin rotored helicopter quickly pitched its nose downward, beginning to accelerate free of the enemy ground fire.   
"This Kilo Bravo, we have inserted and are proceeding on mission, out." Ripcord spoke into the boom microphone on the side of his face as he grabbed another grenade from his ALICE gear. Shaw didn't catch on, however Zap did as the demolitions expert mimicked his friend's move, as they sent two more grenades towards the positions of the terrorists. "Okay! This place is too fucking hot to dick around in! Zap, take Addams and Blackburne with you to Bravo Target! Shaw, you're with me on Alpha Target! Rendezvous at Point Bravo once you've taken the communications array out!" Ripcord ordered as he looked over the faces of the men under his command. "Move out people!"  
"Vaya con dios mi hermano." Zap offered solemnly to his friend as they exchanged a hand slap.  
"Y tu." Ripcord responded with a nod just before the five men parted, each heading towards their objective.   
Ripcord broke from the cover of the bullet riddled UAZ with Shaw in tow, the two soldiers firing almost without aiming at the remaining hostiles. The paratrooper was so intently focused on the still firing terrorists that he didn't see another attack coming.  
"Ripcord! He's still kickin'!" Shaw shouted out, causing Ripcord's eyes to divert in time to catch a blur of motion in his lower peripheral vision. The paratrooper jerked his body to the left just in time for the end of a knife to narrowly miss a disabling blow to his knee cap, instead only tearing the fabric of his BDU pants and raising a superficial cut to the side of the joint. Ripcord didn't give the wounded terrorist another chance to kill him. He immediately flashed the same leg out toward the half-sitting Arabic man, the combat boot catching him under the chin, sending the enemy soldier back to the sandy ground as blood, teeth, and spittle flew forth from his mouth. Without a second thought, Ripcord slammed his boot down onto the man's face, hearing a cracking sound as he felt bone and flesh give under the powerful stomp. The next attack, the paratrooper saw coming a mile away. The edge of his eyes caught sight of two forms rushing towards him. Acting almost entirely on instinct, Ripcord raised his M-16 and fired at one of the terrorists. The two rounds connected with the man's neck and face, sending him down in a thick spray of blood while a burst choked out of his AK-47 as nervous reaction tightened the dead man's fingers. The bullets harmlessly chew at the ground, kicking up sand and serving to distract the man's comrade a heartbeat before he too fell lifelessly under fire from Shaw's rifle.   
Ripcord and Shaw half-fought and half-snuck their work towards the camp's ammo dump, trying to avoid firefights for the most part, but swiftly dealing with any patrols they'd come up against. Every now and then a sitrep would come in from the other teams. The convoy appeared to be stopped for the most part, Alpha KILLER had completed one of it's two targets, and HUNTER was doing a good job of drawing the majority of the hostiles away from KILLER. Still, intelligence had apparently underestimated the sheer number of troops that were present at the camp. The Joe forces weren't getting overwhelmed, but they weren't mopping the floor with the terrorists either. Hopefully JACKAL would arrive soon. In battles of attrition, it was usually just a matter of time.   
After what felt like a small eternity to the pair of soldiers, they were finally close to the camp's ammo dump. Ripcord slowly eased an eye around the corner of the tent he and Shaw were hidden behind. The paratrooper's vision scanned over the area in front of him that was mostly taken up by a sizable area that was sectioned off by a thick wall of sandbags and roofed by camouflage netting. It was the contents of the makeshift bunker that concerned Ripcord most. It was his target. Within the temporary walls rested several rectangular crates of various sizes stacked in neat rows and sections. The crates themselves seemed to lack a common thread to a casual observer, some were made of wood, others of metal, some were stenciled with Russian letters while other were lettered in Chinese. In any case, Ripcord knew he'd reached his target, the ammo dump. He didn't really care what sort of weapons were contained in the various crates. Within a few minutes they wouldn't exist. Content that intelligence had gotten something right for once, the paratrooper focused his attention to other matters, namely the obstacles between him and his target. At what he guessed to be the 'front' of the ammo dump, the six foot high wall of sand bags shrank down to four feet and had two large gaps in the wall. Positioned between the two 'doors' were two fixed 12.7mm machine guns that were fortified by sandbags. In addition to the gun emplacement, four other soldiers equipped with AK-47s were stationed at the front of the ammo dump. Looks like they'd been ordered to hold their post. Ripcord hated the smart ones.  
"Alright," The paratrooper started in a whispered tone as he turned to face Shaw. "I'm gonna blow the emplacement, as soon as it goes, I want you to help me to take out the other guards. Once they're down, we haul ass in, clear it, set charges on the most volatile shit we can find, set 'em for three minutes, then run like hell. Clear?" Ripcord asked, only getting a single nod from the reservist demolitions expert. That was enough of a response for the paratrooper. He quickly pulled a grenade from his ALICE gear and freed the pin, keeping the spoon depressed as he carefully thought out the best way to throw the grenade. Just a few feet to the right and it was all over. They were far too close to the ammo dump to survive an ordinance detonation. Screw it. You gotta take chances. If he did mess it up, then at least the ammo dump would still be gone. Without another thought on the issue, Ripcord tossed the grenade into a lazy arc and threw himself prone onto the sand, waiting for the explosion. Thankfully, he was rewarded with a small, dull explosion instead of a catastrophic one. Ripcord hoped that he'd hit his mark as he quickly leveled his rifle around the corner of the tent. Luck was apparently on his side today. The machine gun nest and its two gunners lay in unrecognizable husks, while another guard was squirming on the sand, blood freely running over his fingers that were placed over his mouth. Ignoring both sights, he and Shaw opened fire on the three remaining guards, each of the stunned men being cut down by the Joes' fire before they even realized which direction the attack had come from. "Move!" Ripcord barked out before the echoes of the gunfire had faded. The paratrooper quickly shot to his feet and sprinted towards the bunker, putting two more rounds into the head of the wounded guard before he finally leapt over the sand bag wall of the ammo dump. What he saw caught him totally off guard. Before he could be sure whether or not it was just his imagination, the clatter of AK-47 fire tore into air, causing Ripcord to immediately dive for cover behind a stack of crates as the rounds tore through the air where he'd just been. Shit. He shouldn't have dropped his guard. The shooter was an amateur, he was firing the AK on full auto. He'd be dry in a heartbeat. Almost in an instant, Ripcord heard the chamber of the Soviet assault rifle click empty. "You are so mine asshole." The paratrooper mumbled to himself as he quickly twisted his body around the crates and leveled his M-16 at the shooter.  
A kid. He hadn't been imagining things. A little boy that looked to be about twelve was working to frantically reload the magazine of his AK-47. A fucking kid. In combat zone. Ripcord's initial wave of shock wore off quickly and was replaced by a determined anger. Wrong. It wasn't a kid. It wasn't a civilian. It had fired on him. It had tried to kill him. It was a hostile. The soldier squeezed the trigger. At that range, he couldn't miss.   
"Clear!" Shaw's voice shouted from further down the ammo dump, serving to break Ripcord from his daze as he stared down at the prone form of the hostile with emotionless eyes.   
"Alright," The paratrooper responded, taking a moment to tightly close his eyes and physically shake his head clear before proceeding, not letting any trace of emotion bleed into his tone. "Find explosives, missiles, anything that'll make this place go up like the Fourth of July. Set your charges and get the hell outta Dodge." Ripcord stepped over the corpse of the hostile without a second glance as he quickly scanned the stenciling on the crates, frantically running his gloved hand along the boxes, searching for English writing to guide him on the contents of the ammo containers. Finally ten seconds later, and what Ripcord felt was ten minutes too long, he found what he was looking for. A plastic crate with English stenciling that apparently contained missiles for the M-72 LAW. Ripcord quickly took hold of the top box in the stack, forcefully pulling it and the whole stack down to sand floor before he swiftly went about opening the boxes and throwing the missiles around the small area. Another few seconds and the paratrooper had emptied the majority of his charges out of his LC-2 ruck and scattered them almost haphazardly around the area. This wasn't exactly a precision job. The ammo dump was like a powder keg, it just took the smallest spark. "Shaw!" Ripcord shouted out across the ammo dump to the other soldier.  
"Set!" The reservist returned.  
"Mark!" Ripcord shouted as he pressed the arm button on a detonator, causing the single red LED light on all of his set C-4 bundles to blink while 03:00 burned onto the display screen of the detonator. 02:59. 02:58. Ripcord had no intention of staying around any longer. "Displace!" He shouted out as he proceeded back through the halls of crates, heading for the back of the ammo dump instead of the front. He had no intention of taking the risk that the entrance might be guarded. The instant he saw Shaw emerge from the rows of crates, Ripcord immediately took a knee and slung his rifle, allowing Shaw to quickly climb up Ripcord, then the wall, straddling the three layers of sand bags before he helped Ripcord over the six foot wall. The two soldiers instantly leapt to the sand below, hitting the ground running, scanning the surrounding area for hostiles as best they could at a full run. However the possibility of an ambush didn't worry the Joes much, their primary concern was getting as far away from the ammo dump as fast as possible.   
Ripcord shot a glance at the detonator after the two had ran a good distance. 00:34. They had to find cover. The paratrooper thought that they were far enough away to be safe but he didn't want to tempt fate. A quick scan of the area revealed a impact crater with the still smoldering wreckage of what looked to once be a ZSU-23 overturned a good distance away, half-buried in the loose sand. "Cover! Crater! Twenty meters!" Ripcord shouted. As the two Joes finally reached the impact crater, they dove into the unintentional foxhole, daring only to reveal their heads to eye level, watching to ensure the destruction of the ammo dump. They didn't have to wait long, for within a few seconds the nearby sky burned as a huge fireball rose from the spot where the ammo dump once was and a deep rolling boom echoed across the large camp. As soon as the fireball subsided and the columns of smoke began to rise, Ripcord keyed his mike. "NESTEGG, this is Kilo Bravo Zero-Three, objective one is destroyed, I say again objective one is history, out." Ripcord said into the microphone, allowing a nod to Shaw as he spoke. Mission successful. He'd remembered hearing Zap call in the destruction of objective two some time ago, so that meant that KILLER Bravo had completed their demolition operations. Now to just link up and support HUNTER. However before Ripcord could think about merging with HUNTER, he had to deal with getting his own team back together. Ripcord's eyes quickly drank in his surroundings, trying to place his location from memory, so that he could find his way towards Rendezvous Bravo and hopefully, to the rest of his team.   
Much to the paratrooper's surprise, the two soldiers were practically on top of the rendezvous point, which was just over small dune that rested near by. Lady Luck was definitely shining on him today. Hopefully it would hold out till he could get outta this shithole. Ripcord began to stand but was stopped short as he caught a distant motion out of the corner of his eye. On sheer reaction, he quickly twisted his body, bringing his rifle up as he lined the figure of a man up in his rifle's sights. As soon as thought bled into his reaction, he lowered his rifle, the approaching figure was wearing U.S. Army issue desert scheme BDUs. It was a friendly. No, it was more than a friendly, it was Zap. The Hispanic demolitions experts ran towards the two soldiers, swinging the barrel of his rifle in slow arc in front of him. Just because their were friendlies in the area didn't mean that the zone was friendly. Within a few seconds, Zap finally reached the two other Joes, sliding into the impact crater and immediately angling his body around to scan the area he'd just came from.   
"Good to see ya again buddy." Ripcord said, not daring to take his eyes away from the sights of his rifle. "Where's Blackburne and Addams?"  
"Back there about a hundred meters." Zap stated flatly as he slid down into the hole taking himself out of view as he took several deep swigs from one of his canteens. "Told 'em to stay put while I scouted out the rendezvous point."   
"Alright, let's go back and get 'em." Ripcord said as Zap popped back up into his guard position, causing Ripcord to slide down into the hole to take a drink himself. "Once we've linked back up with 'em we'll head to Rendezvous Charlie to meet up with HUNTER." Once the two Specialists had allowed Shaw a slightly longer moment to catch his breath and down some water, the trio of Joes carefully emerged from the crater before they began to work their way back towards where Blackburne and Addams were hidden. They covered most of the distance to their teammates without event, traveling in a leap frogging overwatch line, constantly scanning the surrounding area for hostiles. Judging from the radio traffic, most of the enemy force was focusing their efforts on the general area where HUNTER and Alpha KILLER were located on the other side of the camp. However, despite the very logical reason for the lack of resistance, Ripcord still felt uneasy, like he was blindly walking into an ambush. He hated being right.  
The paratrooper was kneeling down beside a tent, intently watching the area for signs of enemy activity, waiting for Shaw to work his way forward from the back of the three man line. He saw the reservist Private First Class pass by him, heading for the corner of the tent when suddenly the air was filled with the deep rumblings of a heavy diesel engine coming to life. Without thinking the paratrooper instantly reached out and grabbed the back of the Joe's Y-suspenders, forcefully jerking Shaw behind him, positioning the soldier between himself and Zap. Within a matter of a few seconds that the trio spent holding their breath, the hulking metal form of a Soviet made T-72 main battle tank slowly worked its way into view, emerging from the front of the tent that they were beside. After a small span of time that felt like an eternity, the tank finally disappeared behind a clump of tents and temporary structures, never reversing its direction to confront the Joes. Seconds later another T-72 slowly entered the trio's field of view before disappearing at the same spot as the first. This wasn't good. Moving very slowly, Ripcord eased himself into a prone position before he low crawled to corner of the tent, daring to only expose a single eye as he scouted the area ahead. This really wasn't good.  
The first thing to catch his eyes were two soldiers, his soldiers, Blackburne and Addams, stripped of their gear, kneeling and bound in an open area. From the bruises on their faces and blood stains on their BDUs, they'd obviously been beaten. Several of the terrorists were gathered around the two, with one shouting in a language that Ripcord could only assume was Arabic. After the initial shock had worn off, the paratrooper realized what was going on. The terrorists were trying to find out where they were. Everything seemed to go into slow motion as Addams' beaten face slowly panned in the direction of the trio, making direct eye contact with Ripcord. No. Addams was gonna give their position away. Ripcord was shocked when the green Sergeant offered only a slow wink. The wink was the last thing the paratrooper saw from Addams. An instantly later his face disappeared in a spray of crimson. He been shot. Before Ripcord could fully process what happened, Blackburne shot to his feet and rushed the shouting terrorist that had shot Addams. The machine gunner wasn't fast enough. The terrorist turned and put two rounds into Blackburne's chest before he began laughing. They had been shot. They were POWs and they had been shot. "Motherfuckers!" Ripcord hissed out, his rage being the only thing that kept him from screaming it out at the top of his lungs. The paratrooper started to rise and move forward but was stopped as Zap threw an arm across his chest. Ripcord hadn't even realized that his friend had moved to his side.   
"Easy buddy. Easy." Zap said slowly, trying to calm the paratrooper down.  
"Fuck that. There's just six of 'em." Ripcord hissed, never taking his eyes off of the prone forms of his people.  
"Yeah, but what about the tanks?" Zap asked, realizing that he couldn't hold back his friend if it came down to it.  
"What fuckin' tanks?" Ripcord returned in an anger filled tone. Zap didn't respond, instead only pointing to several tents that dotted the area. The paratrooper followed his friend's gaze to the various tents, each one housing a T-72. A hidden motor pool. The tanks were only visible at ground level. Roughly a full tank platoon was concealed in the area. This could turn the tide for the terrorists. It had to be stopped. "Zap," Ripcord started with a caged fury to his voice as he withdrew a map from his leg pocket and began checking the girds. "Take Shaw with you to Rendezvous Charlie and link up with HUNTER."   
"What about you?" Zap asked in a concerned tone, which served to raise Ripcord's hardened eyes from the map and place them towards the terrorists who now kicked at the lifeless bodies of men that had been under his command.   
"I'm gonna waste this whole Goddamned area."   
  
  
Good to go! One of the medics who'd checked him out told him, patting him on the helmet, giving Fast Draw the green light to go ahead with the other survivors of Bird Zero-One. He was still sore as hell, but he knew how lucky he was, how much worse it could've been, especially after seeing Wilke. He noticed Hopewell off to the side, his arm bandaged in a sling as he clung to his M-16 with his good arm, hanging back to help guard over the soldiers moving out the dead and wounded. The kid still looked like hell, pale and almost in shock. Fast Draw gave a quick nod towards him, the sounds of battle coming from the west were making him even more anxious to get into the fight. Surrounding them were several craters, little souveniers left behind by the GOD strike, a stray tent here and there standing in stark contrast to the otherwise desolate looking area.   
Waiting around was bullshit, each second seeming like minutes before Leatherneck finally started to move them out amongst the small tents which littered the ground in front of them, causing Fast Draw to avert his eyes and concentrate once again on the task at hand. The big Marine pointed towards him and Pederson, sending the two of them out first amongst the tents while the Marine and Prata were to provide cover. The pain in his back grew more intense as the two soldiers cautiously made a slow jog towards the first tent, covering any small craters they encountered. Luckily they were encountering nothing but bodies. The raging battle heard from over the dunes towards the west let him know Bravo wasn't having the same luck.   
He and Pederson stood on opposite sides of the tent's entry flap, Pederson holding up 3 fingers to which Fast Draw nodded. Go on 3. He hit high, while Pederson crouched low, both frantically waving their firearms towards the inside of the empty tent before entering. It was clear. Once exited, they motioned to Leatherneck that it was safe to advance, both he and Pederson now providing cover for the next two soldiers sent to investigate the next tent. The going was slow, but necessary, again luckily, they encountered little resistance. GOD had made sure of it.   
  
The area cleared, Leatherneck motioned for the men to head towards the large ridge to assist Bravo. Once again, he and Pederson the first two up, the soldiers each taking out one of two terrorists they found crouching on the far side of the dunes, Fast Draw making sure to punch an extra round into 'his' for good measure, adding a muttered under his breath. Pederson waved the others forward to advance on the ridge, the soldiers now on their stomachs, weapons raised surrounding Fast Draw and Pederson. He could see Bravowell, see the firefight ensuing. The dust kicked up from bullets digging into the sand made it difficult to see anything clearly, but still he could tell Bravo was taking a beating.   
A bright flash from the left caught his attention, him now swinging his eyes off to another set of dunes off in the distance. It almost was if someone had been sending signals with a mirror.   
He called out, the soldier to his left handing him a pair. Before he could even check, he heard a loud whistle followed by an even louder blast, letting him know they were trying to take out the team with RPGs. Fuck. He searched the rough terrain quickly, his eyes falling on a small cloud of white smoke providing a dead give-a-way for the men firing on Bravo. I don't think so! He cried out as he unslung one of the LAWs from his back and readying the disposable missile launcher. Clearing himself from the others, he lined up and took the shot, creating his own loud whistle and blast, followed by a secondary blast after his missile had hit. Motherfuckers never even saw it coming. Raising the binoculars to his eyes he could see what remained of a three man team he'd successfully eliminated. He didn't have that much time to admire his work, as Alpha had already begun advancing down the dunes. Nearby gunshots let him know that the area was anything but clear as he half ran/half slid sideways down the sandy dune firing towards anything which fired at them. The team held up again by a large grouping of rocks towards the base of the dunes, now returning heavier fire to the troops popping up from the trenches.   
Pederson, hit it! He called to his temporary partner providing cover fire while the closer soldier lobbed a grenade into a nearby trench covering a few hostiles. Both men took cover as the small explosive sent up a light blast of sand after hitting its mark. Fast Draw was the first over the rocks to advance, falling on his stomach at the top of the trench and firing downward without looking, not caring if the men inside were dead, wounded or alive. It may have been overkill, but he wasn't taking chances. Sons of bitches had taken enough of them already.   
Let's Go! Move, Move Move! The Marine called, sending the men charging forward this time firing more cautiously. They were close to the check point, meaning there'd be friendlies in the area. Trenches now had to be checked before fragged. Once hostiles were confirmed they went about eliminating them in the same fashion, hit em with a few grenades, send in a soldier for the sweep. Sweeping was his favorite part. Motherfuckers were going down.   
The first soldier he'd recognized at Charlie was Repeater, the big man laying down a massive amount of fire, taking out anything in front of them that moved. He looked as spent as the countless shells which lay at his feet. A quick visual let Fast Draw know Bravo was hit hard, sustaining plenty of casualties of their own. Even the big man looked almost relieved to see back-up had finally arrived, and although it couldn't be described as joy, to see Repeater with any emotion was almost frightening. He didn't give any of his usual banter, still shook up from both the crash and everything which followed, instead he sank to a seated position inside the trench and closed his eyes. How much worse was this going to get?  
His question was answered by a simple from Repeater, as he himself noticed the ground beneath him shaking slightly. Grunting as he strained to stand up, he could hear the engines before he even had the chance to look.   
Fast Draw echoed. Tanks. Pulling himself next to Repeater to check over the side he saw his fears were correct. Tanks. Two of them. T-72's. Once again, the shit was hitting the fan.  
  
  
Zap was reluctant to leave his friend, especially after Addams and Blackburne were executed, but he trusted Ripcord to do the right thing. His friend was crazy and brash, not stupid and careless. He couldn't help feeling responsible for Addams and Blackburne, he'd given them the orders to wait. But what was done was done. He couldn't change the past. They were with God now. Vaya con dios. He and Shaw began to swiftly work their way towards Rendezvous Charlie, which happened to be in the same direction that the pair of T-72s had gone off in. Hopefully the tankers were still concerned with stealth and keeping their base intact, if they weren't then two Joes had no chance to beat them to HUNTER's positions. Roughly two minutes after they had left the paratrooper, Zap heard his friend's voice, still dripping with anger, call out over the open channels.   
"GOD, this Kilo Bravo Zero-Three, status over."  
"This is GOD, we are off station and have expended all stores, out."  
"THUNDER this Kilo Bravo Zero-Three, I need fire mission at my coordinates, I say again, bring down Arty on this transmission, over."  
That crazy bastard. He was calling in artillery fire on his position. He was the gridsquare. Zap thought about turning back but it was useless. He'd only catch himself and Shaw in the volley and not be able to head off the tanks that were moving towards HUNTER. The demolitions expert immediately let the issue go before it could effect his awareness. Ripcord was a professional. He knew what he was doing. The two Joes quickly worked their way towards the rendezvous point without any real opposition, they did have to slow down once to narrowly avoid a stray group of hostiles but other than that they had made it to their destination as quickly as possible. It wasn't quick enough. The pair had worked their way up a small dune, which should have had HUNTER on the other side. HUNTER was on the other side as they should be, but so were the T-72s and the tanks had picked up some friends in the form infantry support. Zap had to act quickly.   
"Shaw, stay down and to my left." Zap said simply as he unslung the two M-72 LAWs he had been issued for the mission. The tanks were already firing their cannons at the various impact craters, they hadn't hit any ones that held HUNTER but it was only a matter of time. Working as fast as he could he quickly prepped both LAWs for launch. As soon as he hit the tanks the infantry would be all over him. He would have preferred a TOW or even a Dragon for the job, a LAW couldn't do much against a T-72 but a tank was like any other suit of armor. It had chinks. You just had to know where they were. Zap shouldered the first LAW and waited. As long as the more distant of the two T-72s stayed on it's current course, he'd have the shot he needed. God was on Zap's side today. The T-72's driver hadn't been paying attention and had run his tank into an impact crater, the tank could easily escape it but it opened up a shot on the weakest armor of the tank. Zap pressed the button. The light anti-tank missile screamed out of its launch tube and closed the short distance to the tank in a heartbeat. With the tank on a downward slope, the bottom of its back end was exposed. The thin armor under the tank couldn't hold the warhead at bay. The hot gases easily ate through the metal and continued to travel their path, directly into the tank's engine block. Before the fireball had even risen to full intensity from the first tank, Zap had the second LAW in hand and fired on the tank's comrade. Zap aimed for the top of the turret, his missile not breeching the thick armor but serving to destroy the periscopes and various sensors that allowed the tank's crew to see well enough to operate it's main gun. It was still drivable but was totally without offensive capability. Mission successful. However as expected, the infantry came alive, pouring hundreds of rounds into the space that he'd just occupied. He and Shaw ducked down behind the relative safety of the dune. Time for someone else to save their asses.


	5. Chapter 5

NESTEGG had told them to hold fire. JACKAL had moved in and was working on the convoy and the last thing they'd need would be to have friendly fire rain on them. Still, she kept a watchful eye, waiting to take out any strays that would get away from JACKAL. The waiting was the worst part. She hated not knowing what was going on, the feeling like she could be doing more.  
Just got some bad news from NESTEGG. Long Range called through the radio. Bird Zero-One is down, three Hotel Alpha are down, and Hotel Bravo has two down. Stay alert THUNDER, we may not be done yet. Reacting before thinking, she keyed her radio.  
Any word on who She asked, catching herself before finishing the question. Fuck. She had no way of knowing if Repeater and Fastdraw were Alpha or Bravo but even knowing that would be little comfort unless they knew who was down.   
Negative Eight-Two. He replied, before adding: We don't know if it's any of your team that's down, but whoever they were, I'm sure they're important to somebody. He emphasized the word 'your'. Who the fuck did this guy think he was?   
First off, I'm sure it ain't any of my team, second, if God forbid it is, you can be sure it ain't because of anything they did, but rather because some dumb motherfucker fucked up and caused it, okay? The last thing I need is some know it all sergeant sitting here giving me shit because I ask about the status of my team. It's not like I fucked up what I was supposed to do here, because I didn't. So excuse the fuck out of me for giving a fuck about the six other people that I count on..  
You know, Spec, you cuss a whole fucking lot.  
You know what, Sergeant?  
Choose your next words carefully. He warned, causing her to click off her headset for a minute before saying something she might later regret.. Hotseat was a far better leader than this guy could ever hope to be. At least Hotseat deserved respect. She clenched her teeth and averted her eyes, once again maintaining her composure before swinging an icy stare his way and keying up the radio.  
Just send me in, sounds like they could use a little Wolverine support. She tried. Wolves were primarily designed for close range combat, this artillery shit is secondary. The waiting was the worst, hearing the calls come in, powerless to do anything until they received orders to move, at least if she was there, she could give them some back up.  
"Again, negative. They'll call for support when they call for support, and then you can volunteer your ass all you want. Until we hear it from NESTEGG you're still on THUNDER, and THUNDER waits here until we get told otherwise. Clear?" A call came across the air from Falcon before she could respond.   
"NESTEGG this is team HUNTER, have encountered two hostile tanks and multiple infantry, requesting some tank support. Tank support, the Wolverine could handle that, it was designed to handle that..  
Hold up, Eight Two. Long Range warned. No one moves until we hear it from NESTEGG. Fuck. Hotseat wouldn't be so worried about the chain of command, that's how he got shit done. HUNTER called for support! THUNDER had the ability to provide it, but they were just sitting there. Artillery was bullshit.  
JACKAL, this is NESTEGG. HUNTER needs some back up. Status? Psyche Out called into the radio.   
Negative, Negative. From Steeler, the el-tee in charge of JACKAL. He was at A10. Convoy not destroyed, JACKAL still needed, requesting back up. She swung her eyes back towards the near defeated convoy, back up? Shit, Wolverine could handle that too. What the fuck was Long Range waiting for?   
THUNDER, clear to send in Tango to assist JACKAL. Send Second Tango to assist HUNTER. From Psyche-out. It was about fucking time.  
Before she could move, Long Range responded with a Tango Eight-one, I'm on JACKAL. Eight-Two He paused for a second, her starting to move before he could continue. They'd gotten the clear to go, she'd waited enough. Eight-Two support to HUNTER. He finished, after-the-fact, leaving Grand Slam next up in charge of THUNDER. She'd made it half-way into position when the next call came through.  
"THUNDER this Kilo Bravo Zero-Three, I need fire mission at my coordinates, I say again, bring down Arty on this transmission, over." A smile briefly played over her face. Ripcord. The smile was cut short as she listened to his voice. Something was wrong. Arty on his transmission? Did he mean   
"Negative, Bravo Zero-Three, no range." Grand Slam reported. What the hell was Eight-Three's problem? Stupid bastard, she thought she could count on him. He was at A10. He called for Artillery, you wait for the signal he's out, you fuckin' volley. No range? What kind of shit was that?  
"I have multiple tracks concealed at my location and GOD has reported expended all stores, insufficient weapons to counter, I require fire mission over." It sounded like he was calling through gritted teeth, anger straining his voice.   
Fuck this. Ripcord needed back up. She keyed the radio. "Zero-Three, this is Tango Eight-Two, Im on it. Get your ass outta there, gimme a go when clear." She repeated the coordinates to him, before moving the platform into range. Let them bitch and moan about it later. About a minute passed. Nothing.  
Zero-Three, say again, Tango Eight-Two. Holding fire until clear signal received. Still nothing from Ripcord. Shit! Was he wounded? His voice sounded strained, anger or maybe hurt? Shit! Fire, she'd run the risk of taking out one of her own. Ripcord or no Ripcord, was one of their own. The fact that it was Ripcord made the matter even more complicated. On one hand, Skyboy was good. He knew what he was doing, she trusted that, trusted him. On the other, she knew he'd sacrifice himself for the mission, for the others. Fuck! Why didn't he just answer? She flipped up her display and readied missiles 7-12. She flexed her fingers a few times, checking her watch. Another minute and a half passed. Just answer. She hesitated. She'd give him one more minute then fire. The seconds never seemed to move faster. Still no word from Ripcord. Fuck this artillery shit. She hated the idea of firing blind, artillery sucked. With armor, you had a visual. See your target, fire, see your target disappear. You knew instantly if you hit your mark or not, how many missiles connected, how many you wasted, and more importantly if there were any friendlies in the area. With this you had to count on someone else being there to tell you if your task was complete. You best be out of there, Wally, please be out of there She said aloud to no one as time ran out. She took one more breath, ready to deploy 7 and 8.  
"Damnit Tango Eight-Two, where's the fire mission?" He called angrily. He was all right.  
Holding until clear signal received.   
Clear! Volley, dammit! Ripcord shot out before she finished, her first two missiles shot out before he was finished talking. Three more quickly followed. All sounds of distant fighting stopped as she pressed the releases, the screaming of projectiles through the air the only thing audible to her, followed by several other distant explosions.  
"Tango Eight-Two, repeat, repeat, repeat." The explosions were magnified by his call, he was fucking close. Repeat? Holy shit, how many of them were there? She didn't question, him, repeating the volley until she was down to three missiles.   
"Tango Eight-Two, status."  
Four remaining, say again four. Status Zero-Three?  
"-am missiles." She caught the tail end of something he said in a subduded voice. She was about to ask him to say again when a louder transmission came through the headset. "Recomend rearm. Zero-Three will attempt to eliminate remaining tracks."  
"Goddamn Three, how many are fucking left? Will volley two more, again, two more then copy, rearm.  
"Count zero-two tracks undamaged, zero-three functional." Holy shit, what kind of stores did they have? Eight fired, still five tracks? Did she miss? She punched the control screen in frustration before taking a deep breath and responding.   
Copy. Volley Two. Paden, White, ready reload, Still two on move. She released four and three before more screaming was heard, this time from a different direction. Fuck, missile, from where, from where? She didn't have time to look, barely enough to cut a hard enough reverse right as she could as the projectile streaked by landing close, too close. She could heard shrapnel bouncing off of the vehicle's armor as the missile connected with the ground her platform had rested on just seconds ago. Sons of bitches weren't going to get her Wolverine. She looked up to find the offender, a Heat-Viper hitching a ride on a lone STUN, most likely a stray from the convoy.   
Way to fuckin' go, Knock-Out man. She said with scorn as she readied her shot by visual. One shot, make it count Krieger. She flipped open missile two and launched. One left. The missile hit it's mark, causing the small craft to disappear in a haze of fire and sand, but not before a second shot was fired from nearby. Once again she cursed, pushing the Wolverine forward as fast as it could from a dead stop. The second missile was also too close, the whole platform jerking so violently she thought maybe she'd been hit, closing her eyes to await a secondary explosion which never came. Sonsabitches! It looked like a civie, a jeep of some sort with a meancing looking missile tube rigged to its frame, not Cobra black and red, but it fired first. She visualed and released her last missile, not even taking the time to give a single 'one shot' chant as the jeep too disappeared into a charred haze. Fuck. Spent, and a ways to go to hit the reload site.   
Without the added weight of the missiles, the craft should have moved more swiftly, but it was dragging. Something had to be wrong. Flipping the cockpit's hatch open she crawled out of the craft onto the deck, carrying her M-4 just in case. She noticed for the first time how bad things looked from her missiles. Barely indentifible bodies mixed with the fire-blacked metal littered the sandy spots where each of the enemy vehicles had once stood, the bodies looking almost like the product of a low budget slasher flick. She averted her eyes and went back to the assessment of damage. Fuck! Track left, rear idler bogie was near destroyed. Sonuvabitch! She'd be able to ride it back for reload, but no way would it hold with the added weight of the missiles. Bogies would take hours to repair. Without mobility, the Wolverine would be as useless as the Sluggers. Stupid cheap piece of shit! She said before crawling back inside the cockpit and making the call back to Grand Slam. Tango Eight-Two, hit, major damage track left. Need to She paused for a second looking back out towards the distant pillars of smoke in the directs of the camp and the convoy. Need to pull back. She rubbed her hand across her forehead to wipe off the sweat which was accumulating above her brow before slowly easing the vehicle back. Sorry boys.   
  
  
Fastdraw yelled to Long Arm, as he pulled him back, taking cover in the crater. He took a minute to change the magazine on his weapon before peering out to fire a few rounds at the stray terrorists, smiling as he caught sight of Repeater doing the same in the nearby foxhole that Falcon and an RTO were also holed up in. He'd lost count over how many bastards he'd offed. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the two tanks in the distance. Where was the old man and the chicken-shit when you needed them? He still had a single LAW rocket to go, but would save them until the last minute possible, knowing full well that from that distance they'd practically just bounce off the heavy armor anyway. He felt a large hand grab the back of his neck, and he was forceably thrown to the bottom of the hole as a few bullets wizzed overhead. He'd been focusing on the tanks and hadn't seen the two hostiles approaching. Luckily Leatherneck did. After pulling him to safety, the large marine cut the strays down in succession. The Sarge in charge. Always good to have a big marine.  
He heard the missiles streak in the distance and took a chance to once again peer out of the trench. In the distance, he could hear the artillery getting closer, one explosion after the other from the opposite direction of JACKAL. What the fuckover? They had two tanks firing on them, and yet THUNDER was dicking around? Leatherneck said Falcon called in for support. He figured it couldn't be Krieger, shed watch for the team first. He rolled his eyes as he dropped back into the ditch. Unless it involved Skyboy.  
He took a quick drink from his canteen before rejoining Leatherneck in helping to ward off approaching hostiles, a feat made more difficult by the firing tanks. They were pretty much sitting ducks at that point, where the fuck was backup?   
An eternity passed, still more explosions from the distance, the two tanks slowly approaching their postions. Fuck this. He wasn't about to wait in a predug grave and die. He took one final peek out of the foxhole before unslinging his final LAW.   
Before he could climb out, another explosion was heard closeby. They were still pinned, he hated not seeing what was going on and worse, not being part of it. Another lesser explosion, then momentary silence. He slowly peered up and out to see smoke coming from one of the two tanks, the other engulfed in flames. Where the hell did it come from? He didn't hear any approaching anti-tankers... Didn't matter where it came from, was about damn time it did.   
  
  
Gunshots. Psyche-Out could hear a few distant gunshots getting closer as he briefly removed his headset. From the sounds of the reports coming in, sounded like a hornet's nest worse than Intel had figured. He looked about the tent, quickly taking stock.   
McMillan, Law, Ashleigh, get out there, consider yourself SPYGLASS until you hear otherwise. Take down anyone that's not one of ours. No one reaches the command center. He knew any terrorists that were out that far were just lone stragglers, but then again, with the way things were going, he didn't want to take chances. He patted Sparks on the back while taking another breath before slipping his headset back on.   
Psyche Out nodded his head slowly, listening to yet another grim report, two more soldiers down. He didn't allow the gravity of the situation to alter the calm look on his face, though inside he feared the worst. It wouldn't do the men in his command any good to see him phased, he rationalized. Their two remaining functional Tomahawks could do little more than circle the camp at a distance, taking out any strays which tried to make a break from the encampment due to the high fire intensity. Wounded were still on the battlefield, he had no way of sending in any extractions. HUNTER was pinned down, KILLER was scattered to the winds. JACKAL was having trouble containing the convoy, chances are they'd need a second THUNDER strike, and THUNDER was dangerously approaching the spent limit as it was. GOD still needed another 30 minutes give or take to refuel and rearm before another air strike was possible. On top of that, he had a sinking feeling things were going to get much worse before they got better.


	6. Chapter 6

Specialist Faith Carlton felt like she was going insane. As a communications expert, the reservist had been assigned to the NESTEGG command center; specifically she was in charge of relaying operational sitreps to Headquarters. Needless to say, that was the last thing she wanted to be doing; mainly because it was such grim task at this point in time. Intelligence had grossly under-estimated the abilities of the terrorist group and now HUNTER and KILLER were paying for that mistake dearly. As her headset once again sparked to life, she glanced down at the sight of an M-16 propped up against her equipment table. She remembered hearing a call come in a few minutes ago from the MPs stating that multiple hostiles were approaching NESTEGG. A part of her wished it would come to that. She wanted to be a part of the battle. She wanted to help. She felt she didn't have the right to sit back while the others risked their lives.  
"NESTEGG, this is Control, come in over." An impatient voice called out over the channels for the third time, snapping Carlton back to reality.   
"NESTEGG here, go ahead Control." She returned, giving her head a quick shake to help clear it. Snap out of it Carlton. What if that'd been a call for support? You may not like it but you've been assigned this task and you're gonna do the best damned job you can. Dad raised you better than that. Her restlessness quelled for the moment, the female reservist snapped her full attention back to the headset as Headquarters requested another update.  
  
  
Ripcord had helped to cover Zap and Shaw as they escaped the hidden motor pool, giving them a two minute lead before the paratrooper put his plan into action. After giving them what little time he could spare, his narrowed eyes shot back to his map of the camp, giving the coordinates a final check. He was going to see to it that this area was flattened. "GOD, this is Kilo Bravo Zero-Three, status over." He called into his headset, his barely contained fury bleeding into his tone of voice.  
"This is GOD, we are off station and have expended all stores, out." One of the pilots reported in frustrated voice. Shit. No air strike. One of the first things he'd learned in the military was that you always picked air support over artillery. Air crews could adjust their own damned fire, artillery crews couldn't.  
"THUNDER this is Kilo Bravo Zero-Three, I need fire mission at these coordinates, I say again, bring down arty on this transmission, over." He spoke out as his eyes began scanning the area for possible safe zones. Who was he kidding? He was unleashing a black rain on this area. There would be no safe zones.  
"Negative Zero-Three, no range." A voice returned casually adding an almost cordial tone to the transmission. No range? Who was this stupid motherfucker? THUNDER's position had specifically been chosen for the purpose of being able to provide support to both the camp teams and the convoy teams. No way. He refused to be stopped because the artillery team was skittish about the risk of hitting their own people.  
"I have multiple tracks concealed at my location and GOD has reported expended all stores, insufficient weapons to counter, I require fire mission, over." Ripcord retorted, the harshness in his voice raising slightly.   
"Zero-Three, this is Tango Eight-Two, I'm on it." A more familiar voice called out over the frequency. It was Covergirl. However, the usual rise of his spirits that occurred on the confirmation of her safety wasn't present this time; he was far too hell-bent on revenge for his executed subordinates to let his mind drift far from it. "Get your ass outta there, gimme a go when clear."  
  
  
"C'mon, damnit." Ghostrider mumbled to himself as he impatiently tapped his foot against the side of the Ghoststriker's cockpit. His brown eyes stared out of the aircraft's canopy, intently watching as the ground crew swarmed over the two aircraft, attempting to rearm and refuel the pair of Joe multi-role fighters as quickly as possible. The veteran pilot again shifted in the ejection seat for about the hundredth time before giving his oxygen mask another tug; he'd never bothered to unlock the breathing apparatus or even raise his sun visor. He wanted to be ready at a moment's notice. Even in the current state of having only the drums for the Ghoststriker's three cannons loaded; he wouldn't have thought twice about hauling ass back to the operational zone if it got bad enough. Ghostrider knew the ground crew had to be setting a world speed record, but it still didn't seem fast enough. Before he could dwell on the thought any longer, a flurry of motion at the mouth of the closest hangar caught his attention. Several ground crew members were in the process of wheeling out ordinance to the two Ghoststrikers as fast as they could. The veteran pilot had called in his munitions requests shortly after he and Slip Stream had expended their previous stores, hoping to save as much time on the rearming process as possible. Ghostrider's eyes played over the weapons, allowing him to mentally confirm what ordinance was going to be loaded onto the two aircraft. Six AGM-65 Maverick guided missiles. Six Mk. 82 Snakeye retarded bombs. Four CBU-59 APAM cluster bombs. The ground crew had gotten everything he'd asked for; however Ghostrider couldn't believe what he saw next. Two Mk. 79s; each bomb containing a thousand pounds of the infamous napalm mixture. He hadn't meant for his mention of the Seventy-nines to be transmitted. How the ground crew found them that fast was beyond him; but he would personally buy them all a round of beers when he got back.   
"Holy shit." Captain Karen Dover, his radar operator, said in an impressed voice as her own eyes caught sight of the Seventy-nines. "Those'll sure as hell come in handy."  
"Yeah, if our boys are still there by the time we get back." Ghostrider responded in solemn tone.  
  
  
Ripcord quickly relayed the coordinates to Covergirl and confirmed her read back of his position; wanting to hit the hidden tanks before they were brought into the fight. As he finished his transmission, a movement at the edge of his vision caught his attention. His gaze shot up and landed on the spot where his two men had been executed, the guards still expressing their sickening joys over the deaths of the soldiers. However one of the terrorists was walking away from the scene of the murders. The executioner. The paratrooper's eyes narrowed as he gripped his rifle tighter. He still had unfinished business. The executioner seemed to be slowly heading towards one of the many tents in the area. Ripcord immediately stood and took off around the backs of the densely spaced tents, his feet carrying him as fast as possible to the one where he thought the terrorist was headed. The paratrooper knew he could never escape the coming artillery volley, he just wanted to live long enough to kill the man that had murdered his fellow soldiers. As the seconds dragged out into small eternities, Ripcord finally reached the tent, silently dropping prone as he risked a look inside. He carefully raised the thick canvas of the tent, peering inside as discreetly as possible. Good. It was clean. He quickly wormed his way under and into the tent before regaining his footing. Now what? The paratrooper cursed himself for not giving his plan to ambush the executioner more thought. Fortunately a plan quickly formulated in his head; wasting no time he quick strode to one of the corners of the tent closest to its flap. Ripcord quickly slung his rifle and withdrew his knife, trying his best to be as difficult to see as possible. The beating of his heart grew ever faster as time stretched out, making it extremely hard to keep his body motionless; his cold green eyes focused on the tent's flap, waiting for the features of the terrorist to appear. This was stupid, but it was needed. This asshole deserved to know he was gonna die. Once again, his ear piece sparked to life, causing the paratrooper to mentally curse himself for not turning the radio off; he could only hope that the executioner wouldn't hear its receptions.   
"Zero-Three, say again, Tango Eight-Two. Holding fire until clear signal received." He didn't dare speak into his microphone. If the ear piece didn't give away his position then the slightest whisper would. He couldn't allow that. He wouldn't allow the brutal deaths of Addams and Blackburne go unavenged. Finally his worry started to fade as the figure of Arabic man slipped into the tent, oblivious to the soldier's presence. Just a few seconds longer. Ripcord held his breath as the man fully stepped into the canvas tent, letting the flap drop itself closed behind him. Now or never. The paratrooper shot forward, placing a gloved hand over the man's mouth and nose before landing a hard kick to the back of the man's knees, forcing him to the sandy ground. Ripcord quickly knelt as well, forcing his shin down onto the man's claves, pinning the terrorist in place. In another lightning fast move, Ripcord brought the knife around to the front of the man's neck. "This is for Blackburne and Addams you piece of shit." Ripcord hissed out, retaining enough sanity to keep his voice to the smallest whisper. The paratrooper was about to draw the knife across the man's throat when he suddenly stopped. This motherfucker didn't deserve such a quick release. Ripcord quickly lowered the knife to the man's abdomen, drawing it deeply across the flesh. Without the aid of skin and muscle to retain it's position, the terrorist's intestines quickly began to unravel and spill free from their cavity. Ripcord swiftly stood and kicked the man down; his ears detecting a wet, smacking sound as the executioner landed in a pile of his own digestive track. Without a second glance at the gruesome sight, he headed to the rear of the tent; hearing the barely audible sobs of the still-alive terrorist as he crawled under the canvas wall.   
  
Ripcord quickly made his way further away from the hidden motor pool into an area that looked deserted, his careful trip taking roughly three minutes to complete. He should've known that Covergirl wouldn't have dared to fire with him in the area. This was it, he already heard a diesel engine begin to start up. He couldn't allow the T-72s to enter the fray. He quickly keyed his headset as he ducked down under the chassis of an unoccupied Ural 375 cargo truck. "Damnit Tango Eight-Two, where's the fire mission?" He spoke into the microphone, not allowing his voice to be become too loud. He wasn't keen on the idea of finding out that this area wasn't clear.   
"Holding until clear signal received." Covergirl returned in a stubborn voice.  
"Clear! Volley, damnit!" He hissed out. For a brief moment nothing happened but then his ears heard the tell-tale sounds of a small rocket engine. The sound grew louder and louder until it was cut short, replaced by the tremendous explosion of the artillery missile plowing into the ground. It was soon followed by another. Then another. A total of five fireballs raised from the nearby location of the hidden motor pool; the combined force of the high explosive warheads engulfing the area in flames and knocking down what ever tents it didn't burn into a pile of ashes. The paratrooper strained to see beyond the smoke and flames; his heart sinking when the area's condition was revealed. You've gotta be fuckin' kiddin'. That's too many damned tanks. He quickly keyed his mike again, not worrying about his voice level. If any hostiles were in the area then they'd sure as hell be focusing on more pressing matters.  
"Tango Eight-Two, repeat! Repeat! Repeat!" He called out as he moved more of his body behind the doubled rear tires of the Ural. He knew he was close but he didn't realize just how close. Apparently when trying to evade the enemy, three minutes didn't buy much distance. Within seconds, three more missiles slammed into the remaining T-72s and the few temporary structures that hadn't burned up yet. Again, Ripcord intently watched the area, getting glimpses of the devastation as the smoke and fire boiled about. How the fuck? The paratrooper's assessment was grim. He counted two of the tanks that had miraculously gone untouched while another three looked damaged but intact. Looks like Lady Luck had finally went on her merry way. The area had taken what? Eight missiles? And the place still had tanks that weren't smoldering heaps of scrap? Covergirl couldn't have many missiles left if she had any at all. "Tango Eight-Two, status." He spoke into the microphone as continued to watch the tanks, hoping that he'd see them fall prey to secondary explosions.  
"Four remaining, I say again four. Status Zero-Three." The female tanker returned.  
"Great." Ripcord mumbled to himself before shaking his head. "That's not enough damn missiles." As he finished his ramblings he quickly keyed the headset again. "Recommend re-arm, Zero-Three will attempt to eliminate remaining tracks." Who the hell was he kidding? He had nothing more than his M-16 along with a few hand grenades and he thought he would take on five T-72s? Before the paratrooper could cast more doubt on the situation, another transmission came in.  
"Goddamn Three, how many are fucking left?" Covergirl asked in an irritated voice. "Will volley two more, again, two more then copy rearm."  
"Count zero-two tracks undamaged, zero-three functional." He returned in an equally bleak voice, finishing his sentence an instant before two more missiles screamed in and impacted the target area. Ripcord again saw the blossoms of fire and smoke; waiting for it to clear enough to get a picture of the odds. One of the damaged tanks had finally taken all it could and lay in ruin a good distance away from where it originally was; while one of the previously undamaged Soviet made tanks had sustained a good amount of damage and was on fire. Well, this is as good as it's gonna to get. Time to get to work.  
  
  
Specialist Anthony Gambello, codenamed Flash, ducked down into the bomb crater as he slapped a fresh magazine into his M-16. This mission was turning out to be a lot more hairy that anyone had made it out to be. After roping in the El-tee, Falcon, had immediately ordered them to the link-up point, hoping to combine the remaining infantry forces as per the plan. After a while the combat ready survivors of Hotel Alpha had made it to the spot; but they were the only ones. Kilo Alpha was pinned down just under a mile away while Kilo Bravo was either dead or scattered. So now the link-up point was where he sat; using a bomb crater for a make shift foxhole while enemy infantry kept his team pinned down. The enemy had brought in tanks at one point but someone on a nearby dune had taken care of that problem. Suddenly he saw two men break free of their foxhole and begin advancing towards the enemy. Were they insane? It didn't matter. They were his fellow soldiers. He couldn't let them down. Quickly finishing the reload, he charged his rifle and brought it up again; laying down covering fire for the two soldiers as best as he could. Fortunately the duo of maniacs had made it into another crater, seemingly in one piece. Within a few seconds the rest of the Joes started leaping out of their craters as Leatherneck, Hotel Alpha's NCOIC, waved them forward. They were finally going to advance. But wait, what about the guys on the dune? They had saved HUNTER's collective asses. Flash had to go check on 'em; they might be wounded. He had to help. As Prata, a member of Hotel Alpha, the only other soldier that shared his small crater, started up Flash immediately reached out and took hold of Prata's pistol belt, yanking the tall black soldier back into the hole.   
"What the fuck Flash? We're gonna get left behind!" Prata shouted out as he gave the Joe a light shove. "This ain't the place to be cut off in."  
"No." Flash responded simply as he pointed towards the dune. "They're gonna be cut off if we don't do something."  
"The dude that fired the missile?" Prata asked quizzically as he twisted his body to look at the dune without exposing himself to enemy fire.  
"Yeah." Flash responded with a nod. "Who knows what condition they're in and it looks like we're the only ones who saw it. So it's up to us to take care of it." He finished with a shrug, speaking as calmly if he was having a light-hearted conversation at a bus stop.   
"Alright. Let's do it." Prata said with nod as he a gave a single pound to Flash's ballistic vest.  
  
  
Zap and Shaw had long since given up on the prospect of trying to leave the side of the dune that they were pinned down on. Each time they'd try to work their way around or over the dune they'd be met with gunfire. Shaw had suggested that he use his M-203 to hit the enemy positions but Zap quickly shot that idea down. They had no way of knowing exactly where the enemy was so launching a grenade could lead to ammo being wasted or worse, hitting friendlies. Without being able to move, the two merely dropped prone in opposite directions, each one covering a different side of the dune. At one point, two hostiles had worked their way around on Zap's side; the demolitions expert quickly dispatching both of them. However for the most part the two soldiers had just waited, hoping for the infantry on the other side of the dune to be dealt with.   
"Contact." Shaw whispered, breaking Zap's tunnel vision on the northern side of the dune. The demolitions expert quietly waited for Shaw's M-16 to sound. He didn't dare take his eyes away from the northern side of the dune; the enemies may have gotten smart and sent a team around each side of the dune. "Friendlies!" Shaw suddenly shouted out, causing Zap's spirits to soar. Gracias a Dios! They'd finally broken through!   
"Signal them over." Zap called out to Shaw, still not letting his joys cloud his judgment enough to cause him to pull his eyes away from his field of fire. Within seconds, the demolitions expert heard a clanking of gear and the shifting of sand under foot before a new voice sounded out.  
"Thanks for the save with the tanks. You guys okay?" The newcomer asked.  
"Yeah, we're fine. How's HUNTER doing?" Zap responded, his eyes still focused on the same point.  
"They're starting to advance." The voice returned, raising a nod from the demolitions expert.  
"I'm gonna check it out. Watch this side of the dune for me." Zap said as he rose to a knee, finally glimpsing at his relief. Two soldiers. Both just with M-16s. One was a short and stocky man of obvious Italian decent while the other was a tall and athletic black man. Gambello and Prata. Gambello? It was familiar. Zap knew him from somewhere. The demolitions expert pushed the train of thought aside as he carefully worked his way up towards the crest of the dune. He had a job to do. He could worry about the rest when he got himself in a more hospitable environment.   
Much to his delight, Zap wasn't fired on as he carefully exposed his head to eye level, taking in the scene before him. HUNTER had worked its way forward, ending up in another series of craters slightly more north than its previous position; almost at the edge of the clearing created by a part of GOD's original air strikes. Most importantly, the area looked to be devoid of hostile forces. The demolitions expert withdrew the pair of binoculars he'd taken off of Goldfine's corpse before leaving the Tomahawk and began to more closely search the surrounding area. Shit. He spotted an enemy infantry force a fair distance away from HUNTER's position, slowly and carefully working their way north towards the unsuspecting soldiers. They had to be stopped. Zap quickly slid down the dune, kicking up a thin cloud of sand as he moved down the sloped surface, before coming to a halt near the other three soldiers. "We got problems." Zap said, instantly getting the attention of the men. "There's some infantry coming towards HUNTER's position from the south. We gotta take care of 'em before they reach HUNTER's flank. Let's move." Zap said, getting a nod from each of the other three soldiers. Without another word said, they all headed off at a full run to interdict the enemy force.  
  
  
Ripcord had been carefully working his way towards the tanks when an explosion sounded out, causing his eyes to snap in the direction of the close-by noise, catching sight of fireball where one of the tanks had been. The T-72 that had been ablaze had finally reached its limits. Still that left three tanks that Ripcord had no viable way of taking out. Whatever he did, it would have to be in close, he had no way of going up against the tanks at a distance without a missile. In order to do that he'd have to be as fast and agile as possible, meaning that the first thing he'd need to do would be to ditch his ruck. His ruck! He'd been so consumed about the artillery strike that they'd forgotten about the not using all of his C-4 charges. The paratrooper quickly shrugged the LC-2 ruck free of his shoulders and dumped its contents onto the sand in front of him. Three charges. Three tanks. No room for error. Ripcord took a deep breath as he gathered his thoughts on how to go about the dangerous anti-tank task. After a brief moment, he stood, placing one charge in an empty ammo pouch while the other two were placed in his leg pockets. Now came the tricky part, getting close enough to plant the C-4 without getting vaporized by the tanks' cannons. The paratrooper stared at the remaining tanks for a moment, thinking of the best way to approach them. Sneaking around earlier was easy. However with the absence of the tents and temporary structures came a disturbing amount of open space. Two of the tanks faced east while the third faced west. No matter which way he went, he would be seen. Better by one than by two. After another deep breath, he took off towards the tanks at a full sprint.  
Ripcord weaved back and forth as he ran trying his best to avoid hunks of debris; if he had to stop he was dead. He quickly slid to stop at the first tank; dropping his body into a baseball slide as he skidded along the sand and under the body of the first, undamaged T-72. Working quickly he withdrew the one of the C-4 charges from his leg pocket pressed it against the metal of the tank's under-belly before hitting the timer. Thirty seconds. Moving faster than he'd ever moved before, he high-crawled free of the Soviet made tank; rolling to his feet before sprinting away. He felt the heat of the explosion full force on his back while the deafening report assaulted his ears. Before anything else could happen, he caught sight of an orange flicker on his shoulder. Shit! He was on fire! On sheer reaction he dove to the ground and immediately sent his body into a roll that he carried through back to his feet. He hoped to God that he got the fire out, if not then he was toast. Another movement caught his eye as the hatch on the closest T-72 rose upwards before a figure popped out. The paratrooper could barely hear the clatter of machine gun fire over the ringing in his ears as the tanker manned the anti-personnel gun. Ripcord quickly brought his weapon up, barely trying to aim as he threw several hasty three-round bursts in the tanker's direction, never stopping his run. Much to Ripcord's amazement, the tanker fell back in a spray of crimson on the fourth burst. Breathing heavily he slid to his knees at the back of the tank, while he tore another C-4 block free. Shit! The baseball slide under the first tank had badly deformed the charge to the point that it would have an unpredictable blast pattern. Before he could reach for the final block of C-4, the tank started to turn, causing him roll away to keep from being crushed under the massive tracks. As the tank rotated on the same spot, he heard the sounds of assault rifle fire. The other guys in the turret were trying to find him. But if they were firing then they were outside. Ripcord quickly pulled a grenade free of his ALICE gear, pulling the pin and letting the spoon fly away before sending it in an almost powerless arc right above him two seconds later. He was rewarded within a quick moment with a dull explosion that silenced the assault rifle fire. Working quickly, he leapt onto the deck of the tank, avoiding its dangerous track. A quick glance at the gore covered turret confirmed his hopes that he'd been successful. He hoped to God that the driver was stupid. He quickly darted towards the front of the tank, slinging his M-16 while freeing his M-1911 in the same motion. A forceful yank of the driver's hatch proved his luck; the metal covering rising to expose the driver who looked fearfully up at Ripcord. Before the paratrooper's mind had processed any details of the man, he quickly fired a double hammer into the driver's head before he rolled free of the now motionless tank and onto the sand below, right in line with center of the third tank. The driver of it had covered the distance between his T-72 and it's former counterparts in an amazingly small span of time. It wasn't stopping. It was gonna run him down. Ripcord quickly ran towards the oncoming tank, dropping prone and rolling onto his back at the last second. Only one shot at this. He quickly pulled his last block of C-4 free of the ammo pouch, pulling it close to his chest as he set the timer for twenty seconds. As the tank rumbled at then over him, he waited until the massive T-72 had almost cleared him before slapping the charge against the under-belly of the engine compartment. Without any hesitation he quickly stood and dove behind the now crewless T-72, seconds before a large explosion filled the air. Slowly, and still breathing heavily, the paratrooper rose, his eyes taking in the burning husk of the final tank. With a single nod of his head at the image of the three once proud war machines, he unslung his M-16 as he keyed his headset. "Kilo Bravo Zero-Three here. Proceeding to Rendezvous Charlie, out."   
  
  
"Fire!" Hotseat shouted an instant before he saw another HiSS Armored Personnel Carrier transformed into a fiery slag through his sights. The veteran NCO had lost count of how many kills his crew had made today. The enemy units seemed to just keep coming. However, JACKAL had recently been making head-way. The Cobra vehicles were starting to thin out.   
"Acquired!" Adams, his gunner, called out. Hotseat reverted his attention to the tank's sight, seeing a withdrawing STUN under the crosshairs.   
"F-" Hotseat started, only to have his command dramatically changed. "MISSILES!" He screamed as he pulled his face away from the sight and put a white-knuckled grip on the bottom of his chair. A heartbeat later the massive MOBAT rocked backwards with incredible force. Before the tank had even completely stopped, Hotseat swept his eyes around the inside of the turret. Adams was already moving, unstrapping himself from his seat and pulling his helmet's communications cord out; Hotseat knew he would, he'd trained with Adams since becoming a part of G.I. Joe. A glance at Carson, the loader, wasn't so uplifting. The reservist was slumped to his right, his body unmoving. Shit. Hotseat reached over, stripping off his glove before holding his fingers against the side of Carson's throat. He was alive. Hotseat quickly withdrew a knife from his vest while he keyed his microphone. "Padowski, status." No response. He honestly didn't expect one. He'd seen two missiles streaking right for his tank. He wasn't dead so that meant they hit the front of the vehicle. Hotseat quickly finished cutting Carson free of the restraints, pulling him into the commander's seat as he freed one of the M-4s from its rack. In a motion that didn't reflect his age, he swiftly pulled himself through the commander's hatch, noticing Adams kneeling beside the tank and laying down cover fire with the M-240B machine gun that was normally mounted in front of the loader's hatch on the MOBAT's roof. The veteran NCO quickly tossed the M-4 to the sand below before he used all his might to haul Carson free of the crippled tank. His breathing became more taxed as he dragged his loader off of the vehicle. "Dune, four o'clock!" He shouted as he scooped up Carson in a fireman's carry. The M-4. Hotseat started to reach down but felt his knees start to give under his loader's weight. Fuck it. "Move out!" He called to his gunner before he moved as fast as he could for the dune. Once he reached his cover he finally collapsed under the weight of Carson. Trying hard to catch his breath, Hotseat slipped out from under the loader, drawing his pistol as Adams turned the corner, firing off another hasty burst from the machine gun before ducking behind the relative safety of the dune.  
"Wh...What's it look like Harry?" The veteran NCO forced out, spitting on the ground at the end of his sentence.   
"Like shit boss. Fuckers with rockets everywhere. We rolled right into an ambush." Adams said as he looked into the M-240's ammo box and began counting rounds. "We better get ready. Without infantry support the rest of our boys are fucked too."  
  
  
Psyche-Out ran his hand through his close cropped blonde hair as a heavy exhale escaped his lips. This was getting bad. JACKAL had just been ambushed and was getting cut to pieces, Kilo Bravo was scattered, Kilo Alpha was pinned down, and with all the infighting THUNDER was useless. His thoughts were broken as the radio sparked to life again. However this time was different. The voice wasn't panicked, or even urgent for that matter.   
"NESTEGG, this is team HUNTER, we have eliminated hostile force at our position and are awaiting new orders, do you copy over?" The voice of Falcon called out over the frequency.   
"Tell them to sweep the northern area and try to link up with Kilo Alpha." The psy-ops officer relayed to Sparks as his eyes remained locked on the maps scattered about on the central table of the command center.  
"Sir," A voice started speaking from the direction of the command tent's entrance. "We extracted SPYGLASS back to the perimeter but..." The voice trailed off, causing Psyche-Out to raise his eyes off of the maps and level them at the speaker. It was Law. He saw a distant look on the stocky MP's face before he started again in an almost detached voice. "We lost two men. McMillan and Downtown." As soon as Law had finished the sentence, he his eyes refocused on Psyche-Out while his voice became more urgent. "Is there anything else I can do to help sir?"   
"Get yourself back out on perimeter. We need all the eyes we can get out there." The psy-ops officer responded with a nod in the direction of the MP. "Cause this thing is likely to get worse before it gets better." Psyche-Out mumbled under his breath as Law turned and exited the tent.  
"Sir!" Specialist Carlton called out joyfully from across the room. "Control has managed to reroute a AC-130A, call sign GUNFIGHTER to this area for additional support!" As soon as Carlton had finished, Sparks cut in.  
"Sir, we've also gotten word that GOD has re-armed and is inbound." Sparks said, spitting out his words in rapid fire succession.  
"Alright," Psyche-Out said, as the corners of his mouth raised slightly and his eyes grew brighter. "Sparks, get GOD on the line and get them to give support to JACKAL, then contact GUNFIGHTER, get their ETA, relay them the positions of all personnel inside the camp, and tell them that excluding the areas that hold my people I want that place to cease to exist."  
  
  
"Shit! I'm dry!" Adams hissed out as he tossed the M-240 aside and drew out his M-1911. "I think we're fucked boss." Hotseat didn't respond but he sure as hell agreed with his gunner. This was pretty grim. Carson had snapped out of it but that was the only good point. The infantry keep pouring out of spider-traps like nobody's business and the enemy vehicles were starting to resurge again. Then to top it all off, they were just down to three M-1911s with a single magazine each. Hotseat moved past Adams and looked out at the oncoming enemies. There were just too damned many of 'em. Without warning a distant HiSS went up in a massive fireball. Before the explosion subsided, another followed, a STUN mimicking it's comrade's death. Another HiSS was the next to fall. That's when Hotseat saw it. Two shapes not much more than a couple of hundred feet off ground slid by noiselessly.   
"KNEES! EARS!" Hotseat screamed, dropping to a knee and covering his ears. As he finished the two rushed words he let his mouth hang open. As if on cue two separate and deafening sonic booms rolled across the area. Hotseat saw a good portion of the enemy infantry loose their footing, unprepared for the rush of air that followed being so close to a supersonic aircraft's passing. The veteran NCO's ears barely heard the sounds of the roaring jet engines followed by two more distant sonic booms; the planes were dropping speed and turning inbound again. Within a matter of minutes, the two aircraft returned, again at low altitude, this time six objects detached at irregular intervals from the aircraft. At the back of each object, four fins popped free, which sent the bombs into a lazy fall. Hotseat saw the retarded bombs hit across the area, devastating large areas of land, vehicles, and bodies. Once again, the two aircraft made another run, this time causing a single object from each aircraft to somersault free of the airframe. "Aw fuck..." Hotseat trailed off before his senses got the better of him. "DOWN! COVER!" He screamed out as he dove behind the sand dune. The blast that followed was nothing short of catastrophic. The two large napalm weapons raised a gigantic fireball and deafening explosion. Hotseat knew there was still fire burning, he the felt tremendous heat of it but he couldn't hear it or anything else for that matter. He slowly stood, shaking sand free from his body before he stumbled out from behind the dune which had incidentally, shrunk quite a bit. His breath caught in his throat as he saw the devastation before him. He'd seen napalm used a lot in Vietnam. But that was jungle and the enemy was hidden. This was almost completely different. The sand had turned to glass-like material in several places close to ground zero. Everything that was steel was on fire. Everything that hadn't been steel simply wasn't there.  
  
  
He couldn't hold out much longer. Ripcord had gotten in contact with an enemy force and had ended up being pinned down in one of the smaller impact craters. He knew he was close to Rendezvous Charlie and he'd even heard M-16 fire other than his own fairly close by. But for now the paratrooper was stuck in the crater and running dangerously low on ammo. He just had a little over two magazines and a single grenade left. Once those were gone he was down to the M-1911 and his knife; and Ripcord had no intention of trying hand to hand combat against these odds. He pushed the thoughts away. The more his mind wandered, the less people he'd hit with the rounds he had left. 28. Shot to the hip. Damnit. 29. Shot to the lung. No ballistic vest. Out of the equation. 30. Shit. Ripcord quickly ducked down into the hole, ejecting the empty magazine before slapping in his next to last. As he charged the rifle he heard a call from NESTEGG ordering everyone to give their position. Ripcord did. As he half-listened to the other transmissions he heard Zap's voice. His position was very close by. If he could link up with Zap he could fight his way free of this shit-hole. However before Ripcord could even think about leaving his current position he had to clear it first.  
"All units in the camp, All units in the camp, hold positions and keep your heads down, out." A voice called out on the open channel.  
"Yeah right." Ripcord mumbled to himself. "If I stay down I'm gonna get overrun pal." Ripcord mumbled to himself as he started to sight up for the third round in the new magazine when suddenly his enemy disappeared in a spray of sand and blood. "What the fuck?" Ripcord said in a dumbfounded voice as more sand was kicked up. Then it occurred to him. A Spooky. They had picked up a Spooky. Without any more hesitation, Ripcord ducked down into the bomb crater, tossing his M-16 aside while he drew his M-1911. All he had to do now was waste any asshole that stepped into his hole; the gunship would handle the rest. Ripcord sat motionlessly and undiscovered in the unintentional foxhole for a full fifteen minutes before the gunfire subsided and an all clear was given. Ripcord scooped up his M-16 before he slowly emerged from the hole and took in the scene. Very few structures remained intact. Bodies tore apart by high caliber rounds were haphazardly strewn about like broken sticks. Small to medium pocket marks were everywhere. It was total devastation. "It's about fucking time."


	7. Chapter 7

Even from their vantage point, some 30 miles out from the camp, NESTEGG could hear the blasts from GOD. Psyche Out closed his eyes briefly, all of his thoughts concentrating on the people he had out in the field. With a final rub of his eyes, he turned to his radio operators, noticing for the first time the looks of anticipation across their faces. He couldn't concern himself with that now.   
Sparks, status reports from all teams, now. I want HUNTER and KILLER converging on Charlie. Wounded to evac. Able bodies to conduct a clean sweep of the area He barked. Immediately Sparks began to relay his orders, as the lieutenant still spoke, both calling into the headset and listening to the lieutenant at the same time. Still talking above him, Psyche-Out continued, turning his back to Carlton, and focusing once again on the maps. It was time for this to end. Carlton, get the choppers on the horn, tell them to get set to hit it, I want wounded out first. Co-ordinate THUNDER and JACKAL for vehicle transport. Dammit, Sparks, where's the status?   
  
  
What the fuck was Fastdraw started to say, realizing for the first time how sore both his teeth and jaw had become since the crash. Almost felt like he'd been decked in the mouth. He shook his head to clear the ringing that the constant gunfire had caused and saw Leatherneck making a quick pass to check the team's status. He nodded, he'd be fine. All that was left was to sweep the area. He slapped in a new magazine before slowly exiting the crater, covering the other soldiers who were also starting to emerge from various holes.   
Holy Shit! He whistled through his teeth. Fuckin' look at that! The camp was decimated. Anything left standing after that kind of firepower would be standing on one leg, taking care of the rest would be a piece of cake. The El-Tee made a final check of the men himself, determining who was classified as wounded, and who was fit enough to stay making the sweep.   
C'mon, C'mon, C'mon Fastdraw said impatiently to himself as they finally started to move out. If it moves, we shoot it, we get it, let's go, let's go! He could see a few figures emerging from the south, and raised his weapon. Almost instantaneously, the large hand of Repeater was on the muzzle, directing the weapon downward.   
Repeater said, in his usual stoic manner.   
Big man! Fastdraw said with his trademark half smile, meeting up with Repeater for the first time after all the shit started going down. Repeater didn't seem to acknowledge his presence, but Fastdraw didn't care. He was starting to get hyped up for the sweep. Sitting in a predug grave was bullshit. If he had to be in the thick of it, he wanted to be in the thick of it. Not waiting in some hole in the ground to die. The figures that were emerging from the distance turned out to be Zap and Ripcord, plus a couple of others Fast Draw didn't fully recognize.   
Hey, Amigo, Skyboy. He'd said in a subdued voice, uncharacteristic of the playful banter he was used to giving. The 'don't-fuck-with-me' look written plain as day on Ripcord's face told him obviously KILLER saw it's fair share of shit too.   
  
Leatherneck split up the teams to thoroughly search the area, Fastdraw being teamed with Zap, Ripcord, and Flash, Repeater still stuck on Bravo. He and Zap each tossed a few clips to Ripcord, who was near dry. Bitchin' aircraft took care of damn near everything. Anyone they encountered still breathing soon afterwards wasn't. They walked single file, mostly covering each other, while checking out the dead motherfuckers lying on the ground. Once in a while they came across a breather. Armed, unarmed it didn't matter, all clean kills, one or two shots tops. Despite the fact that they encountered no resistance, Fastdraw's adrenaline level remained high, waiting for something, anything to happen. Even Skyboy looked on edge.   
  
  
All Tango to these co-ordinates, say again, to my mark for evac. Grand Slam called through the headset. Fuck, HUNTER and KILLER weren't given the call to pull out yet, just the wounded. Why would Grand Slam pull them out so soon? What if they needed they had JACKAL for back up if needed. Dammit. Pulling back meant trusting the air support was successful. JACKAL was still there. Hotseat and Heavy Metal. Yeah, he was usually concerned with saving his own ass first, but he never really let the team down, he'd be there if they needed him. Still 5 miles off from camp. Shit. If it wasn't for the damn idler, she would've taken a closer look.   
Tango Eight-Two, say again, coordinates, over. She stared for a minute longer at the smoke in front of her before finally keying the radio for reply.   
Tango Eight-Two, heading home. Request assist, idler left badly damaged.   
Roger Eight-Two, Eight-Seven on its way. The extract site reminded her of A10, only to a much lesser scale. Wounded were everywhere, most sitting or lying on the ground, waiting for triage before being helped onto the choppers. She briefly scanned the soldiers, hoping to not see any all-too familiar faces as she pulled up to her designated Chinook and began attaching the heavy cables to the lift rings.  
We got this. Eight-Seven, White, told her. They could use some help with the wounded. She balked for a second, she'd had basic SABC, nothing to the extent of what Zap had picked up, but preferred to stick with the vehicles. Still, she knew it was a matter of physics, strength did count when you were preparing for transports.   
  
She avoided making eye contact with most of the soldiers she helped with, mostly just applying dressings to wounds or helping them to settle into the web seating aboard the choppers. Mechanics were so much easier. The Wolverine had taken a hit, lost an idler, it didn't cry out. It didn't look at her with almost pleading eyes hoping she could do something to ease its pain. It didn't ask her any questions she didn't have the answers to, questions like 'will I be okay?' Mechanics were so much easier.   
  
Wounded from JACKAL started to filter in, her heart near stopped when the VAMPs pulled up carrying more than its share of bloodied passengers. Walking behind the first one was Hotseat, a small smile crossing her face when she saw the old tanker intact. Making eye contact with her, he didn't offer one back. Instead he crossed to the back of the VAMP where he and another member of his tank crew helped to unload a mishappen man wrapped in a poncho, gingerly lying the malformed corpse down on the field with the other soldiers not fortunate enough to make it out. She downcast her eyes, not wanting to watch, to see the string of bodies which were growing in number, focusing once again on helping to get a wounded soldier aboard the CH-47.   
She gave him a quick Hey old man when he was in earshot, helping his loader aboard one of the choppers. The comment brought a sobered smile from the older tanker, and a Hey kid in response before he too became a temporary for some of the wounded.   
  
More of JACKAL and their vehicles began pouring in, Heavy Metal being amongst the first in-tact crew to reach the extract site, Long Range being among the last. Heavy Metal, that was two. Still four left to go. She wouldn't make eye contact with the soldier who'd been her temporary leader, the first shirt of THUNDER, as he drove his Wolverine up to the extract site, he wasn't worth it. Let him extract out with Grand Slam and Thunder, better yet, let him try and say something, anything to her. She'd leave with her team, her entire team, no matter how long it took them to get there.   
  
The next face she recognized to filter in belonged to the M.P., Law, looking worse for wear himself, like he'd seen more than his share of action as well. Even though not part of their team, she was happy to see him unharmed and offered him a smile and quick two finger salute before he was assigned assisting with the breakdown of NESTEGG. Still four left to go.   
  
The choppers carrying the wounded began taking off, vehicle crews being the next to go as stragglers from HUNTER finally started filing in. Lt. Falcon gave the 'volunteers' the go ahead to board one of the evacs, as he and the other medics were able to once again getting everything under control with the injured. He was still too busy for her to be able to ask about her team's status, besides, she wasn't sure he'd even be able to tell who she was talking about. Sure, he'd introduced himself on the C-5, and yeah, from the way he was watching over his men, he probably was an okay enough guy for an officer, but still, he wasn't one of them.   
  
She could see Heavy Metal sitting off to the distance and smiled. He could have been on the chopper with the rest of JACKAL. He'd stayed behind, waiting for his team. It was a small, simple act, but in her eyes it redeemed him from a lot of the other shit he'd pulled, especially back in Brazil. He was one of them, a Rogue. Hotseat soon joined him, the two exchanging a few words she couldn't make out before sitting back to back on the ground slightly distanced from the activity surrounding them.   
  
Falcon finally relieved her of the last soldier she'd been assisting. Duggleby, as his name tape read, had been hurt pretty bad from what she gathered, his leg looking torn up but surprisingly free of any blood that didn't look long dried. She couldn't do much more than hold his hand and try to keep him conscious and out of shock as he waited for his turn aboard the chopper, avoiding his questions about his leg. It almost reminded of her of when Fastdraw had been hit by the sniper, how she'd fought to keep him conscious, too as he lay hurt and bleeding. The Hotshot came out of that okay, he better damn well come out of this okay too.   
  
Still keeping her eyes trained on the horizon she joined her two tanker teammates as three more aircraft lifted off.   
Sit, kid. Hotseat told her, patting the ground near he and Heavy Metal. Your pacing is making me nervous. Funny, being nervous was making her pace. Still four left to go Another smile played on her face. Three left to go. The large figure off in the distance could only be one person, Repeater. Six Foot Seven and built like a brick shit house, unmistakable. The rest of his team, BRAVO, climbed aboard one of the choppers, Repeater instead joining her, Hotseat and Heavy Metal.  
Last I saw they were okay. He said, pre-empting her question. She smirked, not only because his words helped to ease her mind, but also because she thought that was the longest non-task related sentence he'd said to her since A10.   
Glad you are too, Big Guy. She told him, not expecting and not getting a response.   
After what seemed like an eternity, the final four soldiers emerged from around one of the large dunes, the gaits of the men on her team unmistakable. Her eyes focused on each one at a time, Fastdraw on the far left, walking with a slight limp but still confidently, Zap to his immediate right. The smaller Hispanic soldier raised his weapon with one hand above his head in greeting, seeing his team by the choppers. Next to him was a soldier she immediately scanned over, not recognizing him as she let her blue eyes soften seeing the soldier to the far right.   
She said quietly, her heart now racing, a large smile crossing her face.   
Her smile faded just as fast as she noticed his confidant gait somewhat changed, moredetermined maybe, with the slightest limp of his own. Fuck. It had to be bad. Even Fast Draw was remarkably quiet, offering a simple Hey babe while patting her shoulder in greeting. That was it? No other Fast Draw comments? She again cursed, wishing she could have done something, been there for them. She turned towards Ripcord.  
Are you She started to say, but stopped herself. The look on his face told her he wasn't okay. It was almost as if the whole team'd taken on Repeater's personality.   
Let's move em out, people. Hotseat told them after a brief pause, the somber mood still weighing heavily above the seven soldiers. Fast Draw hesitated slightly before climbing above the craft, clenching his fists into tight balls as he stopped his neck mid- crack. Ripcord didn't say a word, didn't even make eye contact with her as they boarded the helicopter and sat in the webbing. She couldn't help but stare, his features still hardened, his eyes, dark and focused on nothing in particular as he stared straight ahead. She wanted to make it go away, whatever it was, to bring back the light in his green eyes. Only one thing crossed her mind as she remembered the small act that always seemed to comfort her. Reaching over, she grabbed his hand, interlacing her fingers with his, and giving a gentle squeeze. It seemed to snap him temporarily out of his trance, as he tightly squeezed back, and turned a pair of sullen eyes her way. She wanted to assure him everything would be all right, hoping it would be.   
As he returned to staring straight ahead, she noticed for the first time how worse for wear he actually looked. He had dried blood splatters over his chest and arm, causing her to grab the front of his vest for a better inspection. He immediately tried to shrug it off with an 'I'm fine' gesture, as she breathed a sigh of relief, realizing the blood wasn't his. She let her free hand travel up over his back towards where she'd seen what looked like scortch marks, the charred fabric leaving a thin black stain on her hand which she wiped off on her knee. The action caused her to glance down towards his knee, noticing for the first time the small stain of blood below the rip by the knee of his BDU pants. She shot him a questioning look as she dropped his hand. She grabbed the fabric surrounding the tear with both hands, ripping the cloth to see the damage, despite the small protest he'd put up. The tear revealed a gash which spread near across the side of his knee cap. The wound didn't look too deep, but then again, she was no medic. Shit! He was hurt.  
I'll get Zap She told him, starting to stand up, causing him to grab hold of her arm and pull her back into the webbing.   
It'll hold. He said in a low tone, motioning over to Zap. Just let him sleep. Glancing towards where he'd gestured, she could see Zap's head hanging against his chest, the rocking of the chopper as well as sheer exhaustion lulling him to sleep.   
Then just let me wrap it. She asked with near pleading eyes. The same exhaustion made him comply, nodding slowly, too tired obviously to put up a fight as she took a knee in front of him. She went about it as she pulled a dressing from his ALICE gear and applied it to the wound, checking to make sure there were no other wounds. Like the blood on his chest, most of what sprayed his leg wasn't his own. Satisfied that his knee was at least cleaned and bandaged, she returned to the seat on the opposite side of him so as not to accidentally knock into his wound. Going to once again grab his hand, she spotted the bandage hanging loosely out of the front of his left sleeve. Carefully grabbing his wrist, she first tugged off his black glove before carefully opening the cuff button of his BDU shirt. Cautiously she lifted the fabric up before pulling it backwards, not wanting to risk hurting his already exposed wound. Peeling away the rest of the plastic and bandage which covered it, she saw for the first time the scope of what'd taken place in England. His mangled flesh was still pink and raw in places, other places already healed or healing into thick scar tissue. The sight of it caused her to sharply draw her breath in through her teeth, an action Wally couln't hear, but unfortunately, he could see. He tried with no avail to shrug that off too, Covergirl holding fast to his upper arm while removing another dressing. Working as quickly as she could, she covered the wound with the before letting him once again button his sleeve to keep it covered. She hadn't let him pull his glove back on, instead grabbing his hand to hold in hers once more.   
She shifted her gaze towards Zap, as he still was nodding off, still clutching in his hand the picture he carried of his family. As it slipped from his unalert fingers to the floor of the aircraft, the soldier next to him bent down to scoop it up. Her eyes hardened on him as he took a moment to stare at her teammates photo before quietly slipping it into Zap's ALICE gear. Beside the soldier she didn't know was Fast Draw, his head hanging all the way backwards against the chopper's hull, staring straight up at ceiling, shifting uncomfortably from time to time. As obnoxious as it usually was, she found herself actually missing his post-mission rants. Towards the other side of her was Hotseat, the older tanker resting his head in his hands. She took a second to put a hand on his arm as well, knowing his driver had been lost. He patted her hand in response, but still didn't look up or towards her, causing her to drop her grip on his arm and swing her eyes towards Heavy Metal. Like Fast Draw, he'd sat staring skyward, once in a while taking a moment to glance at a picture he held tightly. Finally, towards the back sat Repeater, his eyes glazed over as he stared forward.   
  
The mood between all the soldiers was just as solemn as they reached the airport in Riyadh and began to board the C-141. Many of the wounded had to remain behind at the nearby airbase, too unstable to transport further. She could see in Falcon's face that it bothered him to have to leave his men behind, but he had no choice. Even Law who'd seemed so happy-go-lucky at the start of the mission looked down.  
  
She held fast to Ripcord's hand as he slept, or rather, attempted to sleep, almost afraid to let him go. She'd feel his hand relax as he drifted off, his thumb no longer methodically rubbing up against hers, his head sometimes resting briefly against her shoulder, but it never lasted long. Whatever was haunting him forced his heavy eyelids to shoot open shortly after they'd close. She stayed awake to keep him company for the duration of the flight, even if they weren't doing any talking. She wanted to make sure he was all right. He had to be all right. She promised.  
  
They'd arrived at Pope Air Force base near 02:30, landing at the Pit about an hour and a half after that. The wounded able to make the trip were met by medical personnel and ushered to the infirmary, those uninjured forced to endure a quick debriefing. She'd looked around the hull of the C-141, remembering how crowded it'd seemed before Saudi, not wanting to notice how it'd thinned out considerably.  
  
I know it's late Psyche-Out told them, standing at the front of the front of the aircraft, before the troops could de-board. But you all know the drill, debriefing upon arrival. It won't be anything you haven't heard before, S.O.P, we were never there. His call was right on the money. She barely noticed as Colonel Courage spoke to the group, making eye contact with no one as he droned on about the UCMJ, the JCS and an onslaught of other acronyms that she wasn't paying attention to, instead letting her eyes scan the large room. She couldn't help but notice the respective still sitting together, NESTEGG, HUNTER, THUNDER, KILLER, and off to the side, her team, the seven of them. Wait Eight. Her eyes drifted to the end of the row of seats, some newcomer sitting next to Zap. Covergirl smirked and shook her head slightly. Zap was always picking up strays.   
  
Once outside the debriefing room, the men and women dispersed, even her team opting to head out to their respective dorms to grab some much needed rest. As soon as she was away from the others, she relaxed against the wall, next to where Ripcord was leaning his shoulder against the wall, placing his head against the plaster, still looking forlorn. She stared at him in silence for a brief moment or two before bringing her hand gingerly up to the side of his face, him cupping her hand with his, again gripping it tightly.   
Are you all right? She finally asked, in a whispered tone, afraid of the answer. His normally bright green eyes searched hers before dropping. She thought maybe he hadn't heard her, he didn't respond. She was about to ask again when he answered just as quietly.   
She closed her eyes before casting them downward, letting her hand drop from his cheek, but still holding fast to his hand.   
"Do you want to tell me?" She asked, as he once again stared silently for a few seconds before answering, choosing his words carefully.   
"I had to do some things out there." She slowly nodded her head, not wanting to push, and chose her words just as carefully.  
"It doesn't change who you are."  
"Doesn't it?"  
"No. It doesn't. What happens on the battlefield, you can't control that, Wally. You can't think black or white, right or wrong. You do what you have to."  
"That's not the problem, he corrected with a shake of his head. That's the easy part. Killing only gets easier. You don't allow yourself to think on the on battlefield. You just react. It's easy to forget the meaning of sin out there. It's afterwards. When you realize the horror of what you've done. That when the demons come alive."  
"It's not sin. It's necessity, it's life, it's death, it's us or them. My grandfather used to say that everyone has to walk on the dark side of the street sometimes. As long as you don't lose sight of the light, you'll be fine. You haven't lost sight of it, Wally. It's still there."  
"I didn't this time. He shot back. But what about next time?" She had to think before answering, unsure of how to convince him how determined she was.   
"We worry about the next time when we have to, when it happens. I made a promise to you, I said I won't let you slip. You won't. I don't make promises I can't keep." He slowly let out a sigh, once again staring off into the distance.  
"I know. But that doesn't mean I still don't worry about it." He didn't get it. Her blue eyes softened as she turned, facing him and staring into his apprehensive eyes.   
"I can't tell you not to worry. All I can tell you is no matter how dark it gets, I'll always be there for you. Demons or no demons, you won't slip, Wally. You won't. I promise."


End file.
